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E-UBRARY^A 


AMERICAN  POETS 

AND 

THEIR  THEOLOGY 


BY 

AUGUSTUS  HOPKINS  STRONG 

D.  D.,  LL.  D.,  LITT.  D. 

PRESIDENT  EMERITUS  OF  THE  ROCHESTER  THEOLOGICAL  SEMINARY; 
AUTHOR  OF  "THE  GREAT  POETS  AND  THEIR  THEOLOGY,"  "SYSTEM- 
ATIC THEOLOGY, "    "PHILOSOPHY  AND  RELIGION,"   "  CHRIST  IN 
CREATION,"    "MISCELLANIES,"    "  CHAPEL-TALKS,"  AND 
"LECTURES  ON  THE  BOOKS  OF  THE  NEW  TESTAMENT  " 


PHILADELPHIA 

THE    JUDSON    PRESS 

BOSTON  CHICAGO  LOS  ANGELES 

KANSAS  CITY  SEATTLE  TORONTO 


Copyright  1916  by 
A.  J.  ROWLAND,  Secretary 

Published  December,  1916 


Mo 


PREFACE 


SOME  years  ago  I  printed  a  volume  entitled  "  The 
Great  Poets  and  Their  Theology."  I  gave  account  of 
Homer,  Vergil,  Dante,  Shakespeare,  Milton,  Goethe, 
Wordsworth,  Browning,  and  Tennyson.  The  volume 
had  some  currency,  and  I  was  asked  by  the  publishers 
to  prepare  another  book  on  "  American  Poets  and  Their 
Theology."  After  a  little  consideration  I  declined, 
upon  the  ground  that  American  poets  had  no  theology. 
Most  of  them  being  spokes  of  "  The  Hub,"  Harvard 
men,  and  Unitarians,  I  unwisely  took  it  for  granted 
that  their  theology  was  either  nebulous  or  nil.  When 
I  demitted  my  office  as  president  of  a  seminary  and  pro- 
fessor of  theology,  this  old  proposition  recurred  to  me, 
and  I  considered  the  question  anew.  I  concluded  to 
make  trial  of  Bryant,  since  he  was  the  real  founder  of 
our  poetic  line.  To  my  surprise  and  gratification  I 
found  that  his  poems  contained  a  large  amount  of  the- 
ology, and  that  of  a  very  respectable  sort — for  he  never 
wholly  escaped  the  influence  of  his  early  Calvinistic 
training.  This  discovery  emboldened  me  to  go  on  to 
Emerson,  in  whom  I  encountered  a  teacher  of  a  very 
different  type,  whom  I  was  obliged  severely  to  criti- 
cize. But  when  I  came  to  Whittier,  I  was  again  en- 
couraged ;  and  I  did  not  stop  my  work  until  Poe,  Long- 
fellow, Lowell,  Holmes,  Lanier,  and  Whitman  had 
come  under  review.  These  poets  represent  various 


344943 


Vi  PREFACE 

phases  of  poetic  art,  and  almost  as  many  phases  of 
theological  belief.  By  turns  I  have  praised  and  have 
condemned;  but,  as  I  trust,  with  constant  effort  to 
utter  only  truth. 

It  will  be  readily  perceived  that  the  standard  by 
which  these  poets  are  tried  is  that  of  the  evangelical 
faith;  and  by  the  evangelical  faith  I  mean  modified 
Calvinism,  or  the  theology  of  the  New  Testament.  I 
do  not  scruple  to  add  that,  to  my  mind,  that  theology 
is  most  fully  presented  to  us  in  the  writings  of  the 
apostles  Paul  and  John.  I  regard  these  writings,  how- 
ever, as  only  the  posthumous  works  of  our  Lord  him- 
self, and  as  the  fulfilment  of  his  promise  that  his  Spirit 
should  lead  his  followers  into  all  the  truth.  So  far 
as  I  know,  our  American  poets  have  never  been  sys- 
tematically subjected  to  this  standard  of  judgment. 
There  have  been  books  in  plenty  which  have  estimated 
their  work  as  simple  poetry ;  but  there  have  been  none 
which  have  asked  every  poet  to  .justify  his  theology  by 
comparing  it  with  divine  revelation.  The  result  has 
been  that  the  charm  of  the  poetry  has  often  blinded  the 
reader  to  its  skeptical  tendencies,  even  if  it  has  not 
subtly  undermined  his  religious  faith.  I  have  thought 
it  a  service  to  the  church  and  to  the  truth  to  point  out 
the  shortcomings,  if  not  the  positively  erroneous  teach- 
ings, of  some  of  our  poets,  while  at  the  same  time  I 
drew  attention  to  the  correct  and  uplifting  doctrine  of 
others.  I  have  conducted  my  investigation  with  a  pro- 
found belief  in  the  deity  and  the  atonement  of  Jesus 
Christ,  and  I  have  tried,  by  applying  his  revealed  stand- 
ards, to  anticipate  his  final  judgment.  How  far  I  have 
succeeded,  my  readers  will  judge  for  themselves.  I 


PREFACE  Vll 

shall  be  content  to  receive  even  their  disapproving  ver- 
dict, if  I  may  only  at  the  last  hear  the  Master  say, 
"Well  done!" 

An  old-fashioned  theologian  will  be  pardoned  for 
indulging  in  proof-texts.  Mere  description  of  a  poet's 
views  would  fail  to  convince  the  reader  of  its  justice, 
if  it  were  not  accompanied  by  definite  quotations  from 
the  poet's  writings.  I  have  therefore  furnished  ex- 
cerpts wherever  this  was  possible.  As  in  the  case  of 
proof-texts  from  Scripture,  there  is  danger  that  the 
extract,  in  separation  from  its  context,  may  give  wrong 
impressions  of  its  real  meaning.  I  have  tried  to  fortify 
my  interpretations  by  references  to  each  poet's  "  Life 
and  Letters."  Proof-texts,  thus  interpreted,  express 
the  substance  of  a  document  more  clearly  than  the  or- 
dinary reader  would  gather  it  from  the  document  as  a 
whole.  The  ordinary  reader,  at  least,  will  be  grateful 
to  me  for  saving  his  labor  and  time,  while  the  critic 
will  all  the  more  enjoy  his  comparison  of  the  quota- 
tions with  the  originals.  With  the  single  additional 
proviso  that  my  aim  is  the  limited  one  of  exhibiting 
not  so  much  the  poetical  as  the  theological  merits  and 
demerits  of  the  writers  whom  I  describe,  I  commit  my 
work  to  the  candid  consideration  of  all  who  love  truth 
in  literature.  It  is  my  humble  offering  to  Christ  and 
to  the  world  on  my  eightieth  birthday. 

AUGUSTUS  HOPKINS  STRONG. 
ROCHESTER,  August  3,  1916. 


NOTE 


The  thanks  of  the  author  are  especially  due  to 
Messrs.  Houghton  Mifflin  Company,  authorized  pub- 
lishers of  the  poems  of  Emerson,  Whittier,  Longfellow, 
Lowell,  and  Holmes,  by  permission  of,  and  arrange- 
ment with,  whom  so  many  quotations  have  been  made 
from  these  poems;  to  Messrs.  D.  Appleton  &  Co.  for 
similar  permission  to  quote  from  the  poems  of  Bryant ; 
to  Messrs.  Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  in  the  case  of  La- 
nier;  and  to  David  McKay,  the  publisher  of  Whitman's 
"  Leaves  of  Grass,"  for  the  same  courtesy. 


CONTENTS 


WILLIAM   CULLEN   BRYANT    I-/ 

Poetry  a  belated  product  of  American  soil 3 

William  Cullen  Bryant  our  first  real  poet  4 

He  came  of  sturdy  New  England  stock  5 

His  birthplace,  and  his  early  discipline  6 

Educational  influence  of  the  times  7 

A  natural  linguist,  but  with  little  college  training.  7 
Indebtedness  to  his  father,  and  dawn  of  poetical 

ambition  8 

At  eighteen  is  author  of  "  Thanatopsis  " 9 

At  eighty,  of  "  Ode  on  Birthday  of  George 

Washington "  12 

His  influence  covered  a  period  of  fifty-six  years.  13 

Cowper  and  Wordsworth  his  possible  models..  13 

Studies  law,  and  practises  for  nine  years 14 

Editor  of  "  The  Evening  Post "  in  New  York 

City  15 

His  influence  upon  American  journalism  16 

Untiring  energy,  and  its  physical  conditions . .  18 
Foundation  of  his  character  was  his  belief  in 

God  19 

His  poetry  not  intentionally  theological  20 

As  poet  of  nature,  compared  with  Wordsworth.  21 
Saw  a  personal  God  in  beauty  and  grandeur  of 

the  world  22 

Recognized  the  sinfulness  of  humanity  , 23 

Human  sinfulness  touches  the  divine  compas- 
sion    24 

External  world  beautiful  because  unfallen  25 

God's  justice  is  recognized,  but  justice  is  mixed 

with  love  . .  .26 


IX 


CONTENTS 

A  vein  of  humor  in  Bryant  27 

Truth  and  freedom  are  not  impersonal  28 

Address   "  To  a  Waterfowl "  celebrates   divine 

Providence    29 

Declared  his  reliance  on  Christ  for  salvation  . .  31 

Wrote  hymns   for  public  worship  31 

Declared  the  world-wide  supremacy  of  Christ. .  35 

Yet  we  do  not  read  of  the  Cross  in  his  poetry.  36 

An  unwavering  belief  in  immortality  36 

Poems  addressed  to  his  wife  37 

Separation  caused  by  death  is  not  lasting 39 

Filial  piety  one  of  his  noblest  traits  41 

Bryant's  limitations :  he  is  descriptive  and  medi- 
tative, but  never  lyric  or  dramatic  44 

Explanation  of   the  somberness  of  his  verse..  45 

He  lacked  the  recognition  of  a  present  Christ..  45 
Sees  in  nature  the  transcendence,   rather  than 

the  immanence,  of  God   46 

His     translations     of     the     "  Iliad "     and     the 

"Odyssey"    47 

He   brings    us    "authentic   tidings   of    invisible 

things "    48 


RALPH  WALDO  EMERSON    49~IO3 

Emerson  the  heir  of  eight  generations  of  Puri- 
tan divines  51 

Straitened     circumstances,     but     habitual     self- 
reliance    Si 

His  intellectual  "  Declaration  of  Independence  " .     52 
Bryant  more  simple  and  intelligible  than  Emer- 
son         53 

Is  Emerson  philosopher,  poet,  or  prophet? 53 

He  had  no  system,  and  his  philosophy  is  eclectic.     54 
The  poet   of   transcendentalism,   but   of   trans- 
scendentalism  under  bonds   to   a   naturalistic 

philosophy  54 

He   begins   with   nature,    instead   of   beginning 

with  man   55 

Nature  is  necessitated  and  deterministic  will  ..     56 


CONTENTS 

Transcendentalism   is   a   compound   of    English 
idealism,  German  intuitionalism,  and  Oriental 

immanence    56 

His  idealism  led  to  pantheism,  rather  than  to 

theism    57 

His   intuitionalism  made  the  inner  light  an  ex- 
clusive source  of  knowledge  58 

Emerson's    intuitions    are    colored   by   finiteness 

and  sin    60 

They  need  to  be  corrected  by  positive  revela- 
tion         60 

The   immanence    taught    is    an    impersonal    im- 
manence         63 

Compare  with  it  the  immanence  of   Christ,  as 

taught  by  Jonathan  Edwards  65 

He  lacked  humility  and  the  sense  of  sin  66 

Regarded  sin   as   a  necessity,   always   resulting 

in  good   67 

A  discord  necessary  to  perfect  harmony  70 

The  remedy  of  evil  is  in  self,  not  in  God 71 

The  poet  is  simply  the  emancipated  man  73 

Emerson   is  neither  simple,  sensuous,  nor  pas- 
sionate         74 

He    has   the    substance    of   poetry,    without   its 

form    75 

He  shows  an  open  heaven  and  a  present  God..     76 
But  this  God  is  indistinguishable  from  ourselves.     76 

This  God  does  not  hear  or  answer  prayer 78 

Yet  Emerson's  positive  doctrine  of  individuality 

is  valuable    ,. 80 

Painfully  slighting  allusions  to  Jesus  81 

He  left  the  ministry  because  he  could  not  wor- 
ship Jesus    < 83 

His  message  became  the  fallible  message  of  a 

human  seer   84 

His    optimism    is    a    pantheistic    denial    of    any 

moral   evil    84 

The  evangelization  of  men  did  not  interest  him.     88 
Yet   all   the  good   in  his   doctrine   came   from 

Christ    89 

We  praise  his  recognition  of  spirit  in  matter..     89 


Xll  CONTENTS 

An  apostle  of  human  freedom  only  in  the  ab- 
stract    91 

He  was  slow  to  oppose  secession  of  our  South- 
ern States 93 

Conceived  of  Christianity  as  a  merely  ethical 

philosophy  94 

No  clear  belief  in  personal  immortality  95 

His  personal  characteristics,  physical  and  men- 
tal    97 

A  monist,  but  not  an  ethical  monist  100 

His  burial  in  the  great  Cathedral  of  Nature  ..  103 

JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER    105-158 

Of  all  our  poets,  the  most  American  107 

Profoundly  and  pervasively  religious  107 

An  Orthodox  Quaker   108 

The  inner  light  tested  and  corrected  by  Scrip- 
ture    109 

Protested   against   Puritan   intolerance  no 

Revolt  held  in  check  by  his  principles  of  peace. .  in 

His  description  of  Quaker  life  and  doctrine  ..  112 

His  inner  light  differed  from  Emerson's  114 

Early   surroundings   and  privations  115 

His  reading  wakened  an  intense  love  of  litera- 
ture    1 16 

An  early  poem  attracted  the  attention  of  Gar- 
rison    117 

His  first  poetry  was  journalistic  117 

Garrison  summoned  him  to  join  the  abolitionists.  119 

He  gave  himself  to  the  anti-slavery  cause 120 

And  paid  the  penalty  of  ostracism  and  poverty.  121 

His  differences  with  Garrison  124 

His  scathing  fulmination  against  Daniel  Web- 
ster    125 

But  subsequent  compassion,  in  "  The  Lost  Oc- 
casion "  126 

Corrects  the  early  faults  of  his  poetry  127 

Public  favor  and  freedom  from  financial  care..  128 
His    faith    in    evangelical    truth    shown    in    his 

hymns 130 


CONTENTS  Xlll 

His  one  book  was  the  Bible  ...< 131 

He  believed  in  a  personal  God  of  justice  and 

of  love    132 

Penalty  is  always  disciplinary  and  remedial  . . .  134 
Illustrated  by  the  mother's  training  of  her  child.  136 
Genuine  conviction  of  sin  at  the  basis  of  his 

poetry    137 

Sin  and  suffering  are  inseparable  138 

In  Christ  alone  he  trusts  for  himself  and  for 

others    139 

God  is  one;  Christ  is  the  same  eternal  One; 
The  Holy  Spirit  is  the  same  Christ  mani- 
fested within  us  140 

A  practical  view   of   the    Trinity,  possibly   Sa- 

bellian    141 

His  acceptance  of  Christ's  sacrifice  on  his  be- 
half    142 

The  mercy  of  God  is  his  only  hope  143 

Not  so  far  away  from  Calvinism  as  he  thought.   145 

Faith  in  the  ultimate  triumph  of  goodness 146 

Yet  he  is  not  a  Universalist  147 

Feared   for  the  lost,   not  outward  punishment, 

but  inward  suffering   148 

Firm     faith     in    personal    immortality,     unlike 

Emerson   149 

His  genius  was  rustic  and  homely,  but  conse- 
crated to  God  151 

A  natural  balladist,  in  "  Barbara  Frietchie  "  and 

"Maud  Muller"    152 

Prosperity  and  comfort  crowned  his  latter  days.   153 

"  The  end  of  that  man  was  peace  "   154 

The  secret  of  his  life  was  his  humble  faith  in 
God  157 

EDGAR  ALLAN  POE    159-206 

Whittier  and  Poe  both  unlike  and  like  161 

Griswold's    conclusions    have    been    essentially 

justified    163 

Poe's  ancestry  and  early  training  163 

His  schooling  in  England  , 165 


XIV  CONTENTS 

His  earliest  verses  striking  and  melodious   166 

His  dissipated  life  at  college  168 

Two  years  in  the  army,  under  an  assumed  name.  169 
A  few  months  in  the  West  Point  Military 

Academy    169 

His  patron  casts  him  off,  and  he  becomes  in- 
temperate    1 70 

His  inordinate  desire  for  literary  fame  171 

He  prints  "Tamerlane"  and  "Al  Aaraaf "  ...  171 
His  early  poetry  lacks  unity  and  rationality  ..  174 
First  successful  work  is  his  prose  "  Tales  of 

the  Arabesque  and  the  Grotesque"   174 

These  are  tales  of  the  charnel-house,  and  they 

aim  to  startle   175 

Poe    becomes    an    editor    and    a    critic    unduly 

harsh    1 76 

The  illness  and  death  of  his  young  wife  177 

Commemorated  in  his  poem  "Annabel  Lee"  ..  178 
Regarded  himself  as  a  victim,  not  as  a  criminal  179 

His  miserable  death  in  Baltimore  181 

A  professed  atheist,  he  still  fears  God's  judg- 
ment    182 

Conceit  of  his  own  powers  blinded  him  183 

His     theology    declared     in    his    prose    poem, 

"  Eureka  "    184 

He  regarded  mind  as  a  sensitive  form  of  matter.   184 
We  are  parts  of  God,  and  shall  ourselves  be- 
come  God    186 

God  is  only  material  force,  without  intelligence 

or  love    187 

Truth  and  goodness  are  by-products  of  beauty. .  188 
Poetry  is  the  expression  of  merely  physical 

loveliness    188 

There  is  no  standard  of  beauty,  and  beauty  is 

lost   189 

He  reveled  in  abnormal  and  revolting  incidents.  191 
Dealt  in  the  "witchery  of  words,"  as  in  his 

poem  "  The  Bells  "  192 

His  essays :  "  The  Poetic  Principle,"  "  The  Phi- 
losophy of  Composition,"  and  "  The  Rationale 
of  Verse  " 194 


CONTENTS  XV 

Mastery  of  technique,  but  ever-gathering  gloom.  198 
"  The  Haunted  Palace  "  a  picture  of  Poe's  own 

soul    201 

A  haunting  melody  is  not  the  highest  poetry..  202 
To  satisfy  the  mind,  substance  must  equal  form.  202 
His  poetry  is  melody  without  truth  and  with- 
out love   203 

Quotations  from  Griswold  and  from  Tennyson.  203 


HENRY   WADSWORTH    LONGFELLOW     207-263 

Great  influence  of  Longfellow  upon  young  men 

of  the  last  generation  209 

Of  all  our  American  poets  the  most  beloved  . .  210 

His  family  and  his  early  home  210 

His  indebtedness  to  Irving  and  to  Bryant 212 

Hawthorne,  Abbott,  and  Pierce  his  college  mates 

at  Bowdoin   213 

Indians   of   Maine  suggested  his   future  "Hia- 
watha "    213 

Early  verses  and  literary  ambition  214 

Professorship  of  Modern  Languages,  and  three 

years  abroad   215 

"  Outre-Mer "  his  first  work  in  prose  218 

Appointment  to  Harvard,  marriage,  and  death 

of  his  wife  219 

"  Hyperion "     shows     growing    originality    and 

unity    221 

Swings  off  from  federal  theology  to  Unitarian- 
ism     222 

Though  unevangelical,  still  a  Christian  poet  . . .  223 
Discovers  his  vocation,  and  prints  "  The  Voices 

of  the  Night "  225 

Influence  of  "A  Psalm  of  Life"  soothing  and 

inspiring  226 

His  second  marriage,  noble  house,  and  liberal 

hospitality  226 

Loss  of  his  wife  leads  to  his  translation  of 

Dante  228 

1843  to  1861  his  most  productive  years  229 


CONTENTS 

Most  successful  in  his  shorter  poems  231 

"Evangeline"  and  "The  Song  of  Hiawatha"..  231 

"  The  Courtship  of  Miles  Standish "  234 

"  Christus  "  lacks  intensity  and  condensation  . .  234 
Its  main  defect  an  insufficient  estimate  of  Jesus 

Christ    235 

Without   proper   knowledge   of    divine   holiness 

and  human  sin  236 

As  far  from  skepticism  as  from  mysticism  . . .  238 
Growing  tendency  to  a  pagan  view  of  the  world.  239 
"  Hermes    Trismegistus "    indicates    a   final    ag- 
nostic attitude    241 

"  Poems  on  Slavery "  did  not  please  abolition- 
ists    243 

Our  poet  of  national  Union  and  of  universal 

Peace   244 

His  genius  representative,  rather  than  creative.  246 
"Michael  Angelo "  is  almost  autobiographical.  246 
His  gentle  and  kindly  spirit  shown  in  his  rela- 
tion to  others   250 

Though     not    professedly     or     demonstratively 

Christian 253 

Faith  in  an  overruling  divine  Providence 254 

"  Morituri    Salutamus "    gives    his    thoughts    in 

view  of  death  255 

Faith    in    immortality    strongest    in    his    early 

poems    256 

Would  have  been  a  greater  poet,  if  he  had 
rightly  understood  God's  holiness,  man's  sin, 

and  Christ's  atonement  261 

His  last  days  sunny  and  genial  262 

His  bust  in  Westminster  Abbey  intimates  that 
he  is  a  poet  of  the  whole  English-speaking 
race  263 


JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL    265-317 

Lowell  is  our  chief  poetical  moralist  267 

Hampered  by  the  brilliancy  of  his  genius  267 

His  ethics  took  the  form  of  patriotism  268 


CONTENTS 

Parentage   and   education   give  him   a  bent  to 

literature    268 

Marriage   stimulates  his  moral  impulses, 271 

His  first  book  of  poems  full  of  allusions  to  his 

inamorata    272 

Her  early  death  makes  him  serious  and  sympa- 
thetic      273 

Begins    a    series    of   prose    essays    on    English 

dramatists    274 

"Biglow    Papers,"    "Fable    for    Critics,"    "Sir 

Launfal "    274 

Poems  suggested  by  domestic  sorrow  275 

Growth  of  the  ethical  principle  in  his  mind  and 

writing    277 

His  interest  turning  from  literature  to  politics.  280 

The  "  Biglow  Papers  "  his  greatest  work  282 

They  showed  the  true  greatness  of  the  Yankee 

stock    284 

These  dialect  poems  first  made  him  famous  . .  285 

Appointed  professor  in  Harvard  College  289 

His     "  Commemoration     Ode "     and    "  Concord 

Bridge "    291 

Second  marriage,  and  editorship  of  "  The  At- 
lantic  Monthly "    292 

Minister  to  Madrid,  and  in  1880  to  London  .. . .  293 
His  wit  was  a  large  part  of  his  endowment  . .  293 
His  public  addresses  sane  and  statesmanlike,  ..  294 
"  The  Cathedral "  recognizes  an  indwelling  God, 

but   not   one   transcendent 295 

Therefore  does  not  believe  in  miracle  or  special 

revelation    _.  295 

An  error  as  to  man's  moral  condition  and  need.  296 
An  unmoral  God  needs  no  Mediator  and  no  di- 
vine   Saviour    298 

Each  man  is  his  own  redeemer  299 

Lowell's    "  Cathedral "    compared   with    Brown- 
ing's  "  Saul "    300 

Religion   gives  him   little  comfort   in  bereave- 
ment      301 

His  future  life  has  no  connection  with  Christ..  302 
He  has  missed  the  true  theory  of  morals  303 


XV111  CONTENTS 

Gives  us  detached  maxims,  without  foundation, 
motive,  or  life  303 

Bible  preaching,  not  moralistic  poetry,  carried 
us  through  our  Civil  War  304 

Denies  special  inspiration,  but  all  men  are  in- 
spired   305 

God  is  only  another  name  for  nature 306 

On  capital  punishment,  Lowell  compared  with 
Wordsworth  308 

His  wit  misplaced  when  he  ridicules  the  Cross.  309 

Wrongly  fancied  that  ethics  drew  him  away 
from  poetry  311 

Better  theology  would  have  made  him  a  better 
poet  312 

The  good  in  his  poetry  rests  on  an  inherited 
Christian  faith  313 

Greater  as  essayist  than  as  poet  314 

Warmth  of  affection  shown  in  poems  addressed 
to  friends  314 

He  estimates  himself  truly  in  his  "  Fable  for 
Critics "  316 


OLIVER   WENDELL   HOLMES 


Holmes  is  our  poetical  humorist  .............  321 

Fortunate  in  his  parentage  and  early  training.  322 
In  his  boyhood  conceives  a  great  dislike  for 

Calvinism    ..................................  324 

Andover  Academy  and  Harvard  College  ......  325 

His  long  series  of  class-poems    ...............  326 

Versifying  began  before  he  had  learned  to 

write    ......................................  328 

"Old  Ironsides"  and  "  The  Last  Leaf"  never 

afterward  surpassed  —  .....................  329 

Studies  medicine,  and  spends  two  years  in  Paris.  331 
Begins  medical  practice  in  Boston,  which  lasts 

twelve   years    ..............................  332 

Professor  of  anatomy  at  Harvard  for  thirty- 

five  years  ..................................  333 


CONTENTS 

His  "Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table"  makes 

him  famous   334 

Charles     Eliot     Norton's     characterization     of 

Holmes    334 

His  mind  discursive,  rather  than  philosophic . . .  335 
"  The  Deacon's  Masterpiece  "  and  "  The  Cham- 
bered  Nautilus "    336 

Encouraged  to  venture  upon  novel  literature..  338 
His  novels  are  "  novels  with  a  purpose,"  and 

that  purpose  is  the  confutation  of  Calvinism.  339 
Holds  that  inherited  tendencies  to  evil  are  not 

moral    339 

Opposes  hyper-Calvinism,  rather  than  Calvinism.  341 
Scripture  and  philosophy  are  against  Holmes..  342 
He  understood  neither  the  evil  nor  the  remedy.  343 
Regarded  Christ  as  an  example,  but  not  as  a 

Saviour   343 

Holmes    shows    the    downward    gravitation    of 

Unitarianism    344 

Evangelical  faith  the  only  alternative  to  agnos- 
ticism      346 

Holmes's  hymns  are  hymns  to  the  God  of  na- 
ture   346 

The  fatalistic  inheritance  of  physical  evil  throws 

the  blame  of  it  back  upon  God  349 

Bitterness  of  Holmes's  theological  animus  ....  350 
Somewhat  excused  by  extravagancies  of  hyper- 

Calvinists    351 

The  ethical  fruits  of  his  doctrine  352 

He  shrank  from  the  reform  movements  of  his 

time    353 

As   far  from  transcendentalism  as   from  aboli- 
tionism      356 

His    "  Life    of    Emerson "    and    "  Memoir    of 

Motley "    357 

Poems  at  public  dinners,  and  tributes  to  friends.  359 

An  entertainer,  rather  than  a  teacher  362 

A  poet  of  this  life,  not  of  the  life  to  come  ...  362 

His  humor  lasted  to  old  age  363 

Lowell's    characterization    of   the  poet   and   the 
man    367 


XX  CONTENTS 


SIDNEY  LANIER 369-418 

The  relation  between  poetry  and  music  371 

Lanier  was  primarily  a  musician,  secondarily 
a  poet  371 

Our  chief  poetical  musician  372 

Lanier  and  Poe,  their  resemblances  and  their 
differences  372 

Lanier's  passion  for  music,  and  his  mastery  of 
the  flute  374 

His  devotion  to  poetry  came  late  in  his  devel- 
opment    375 

College  course,  religious  nature,  and  struggles  to 
learn  his  duty  376 

His  Christian  faith  confirmed  by  study  of 
science  377 

Outbreak  of  the  Civil  War  arrests  his  scho- 
lastic work  378 

Three  years  in  the  Confederate  Army,  and  final 
capture  and  imprisonment  weaken  his  consti- 
tution    379 

Desperate  illness,  and  hemorrhage  of  the  lungs.  381 

Marriage,  practice  of  law,  dawn  of  poetical 
ambition  381 

Love-poems  addressed  to  his  wife  383 

"  The  Jacquerie,"  the  longest  of  his  poems,  but 
a  fragment  384 

"  Resurrection "   and  "  A   Ballad  of  Trees  and 

the  Master"   385 

.  Position  in  the  Symphony  Orchestra  of  Balti- 
more     387 

For  eight  years  a  heroic  fight  with  death 387 

His  poem  "  Corn "  first  brings  him  into  public 
notice  387 

"The  Symphony"  leads  to  his  appointment  to 
write  the  "  Centennial  Cantata "  300 

A  poem  to  be  sung,  not  read,  it  is  severely 
criticized  390 

Launched  on  a  literary  career,  but  handicapped 
by  disease  ,,,,,,,, 392 


CONTENTS 

"  The  Marshes  of  Glynn  "  often  called  his  best 

production    393 

"  Individuality "    shows    faith   in   a   moral    self- 
hood    395 

Lectures  at  Johns  Hopkins  University  396 

"  The  beauty   of   holiness   and   the   holiness   of 

beauty    mean    one    thing " 397 

His  "  Science  of  English  Verse "  interprets  the 

forms  of  poetry  in  terms  of  music  397 

Makes   rhythm   consist   in   time   rather  than  in 

accent    397 

Music  too  much  dominated  his  poetry  399 

Christian   faith   implicit  in  his  poems   400 

God's  love  enables   us  to   face  the  problem  of 

sin    401 

"  How  Love  Looked  for  Hell "  incorrectly  makes 

sin   furnish  its  own  remedy  404 

His  strong  faith  in  immortality 405 

"  The   Crystal "   is  his   greatest  poem  407 

Its   characterizations   of   great  names   in  litera- 
ture show  him  to  be  a  natural  critic  408 

His  affection  for  his  friends,  and  his  optimism.  410 
He  applied  the   scientific  method  to  the   study 

of  poetry    414 

His  indomitable  spirit  persisted  to  the  end  ...  415 
A  noble  poetic  gift  in  process  of  development..  416 
Its    premature    ending   on    earth    argues    a    life 
beyond    417 


WALT    WHITMAN     419-470 

Difficulty  in  finding  a  ninth  poet  421 

Whitman's  significant  choice  of  the  nickname 

"  Walt  "  421 

The  poet  considered  from  three  points  of  view : 

his  art,  his  morality,  and  his  religion  422 

^  Poetry  must  have  a  correct  view  of  nature  . . .  423 

Free-verse  is  not  necessarily  poetry  423 

It  needs  to  have  a  true  philosophy  underlying  it.  424 
The  early  life  of  Whitman  as  a  preparation  for 

his  writing  425 


XX11  CONTENTS 

His  tour  of  our  Southern  States,  and  its  free- 
dom from  restraint  426 

Returning  home,  he  gives  himself  to  poetry  and 
not  to  prose  427 

Two  sources  of  his  philosophy,  Elias  Hicks  and 
Ralph  Waldo  Emerson  428 

The  influence  of  Quakerism  upon  his  method  of 
thought  428 

The  influence  of  transcendentalism  upon  his 
thinking  428 

The  poet  regards  his  own  personality  as  ex- 
pressing the  All  429 

Emerson  commends  "  Leaves  of  Grass "  to  the 
general  public  430 

Whitman  persists  in  his  method  in  spite  of 
Emerson's  criticisms 431 

A  pantheistic  philosophy  degrades  the  form  of 
art  433 

Free-verse  is  an  undeveloped  and  lower  kind  of 
poetry  433 

"  O  Captain !  my  Captain !  "  is  Whitman's  high- 
est achievement  434 

The  poet's  egotism  also  impairs  the  value  of 
his  art  435 

He  could  not  tell  the  commonplace  from  the 
inspired  436 

His  glorification  of  the  body  makes  his  poems 
often  immoral  436 

He  chooses  a  non-moral  in  place  of  a  moral 
God  439 

He  confesses  to  being  the  father  of  six  illegiti- 
mate children  439 

Awakens  suspicion  of  even  more  serious  lapses 
from  virtue  440 

His  "  comradeship "  was  of  a  peculiar  sort  . . .  442 

How  far  are  bodily  organs  the  proper  subjects 
of  poetry?  443 

Whitman  exalted  obscenity  into  a  principle  ...  443 

Yet  noted  literary  men  praised  his  work /|/|/| 

Our  Civil  War  made  Whitman  democratic  and 
sympathetic  445 


CONTENTS  XX111 

His  care  for  the  sick  and  wounded  445 

Stricken  with  paralysis  he  retires  to  Camden..  447 
After  eighteen  years  of  ascetic  living  he  breathes 

his  last    447 

His  democracy  is  freedom  without  law 450 

The  influence  of  music  upon  his  verse  452 

He  claimed  to  be  the  founder  of  a  new  religion.  453 
It  was  a  religion  of  affectionate  impulse  with- 
out moraTlirw~0r  a  personal  God  453 

His  aversion  to  preachers  and  churches  455 

Self-deifying,  he  makes  Jehovah,  Christ,  Satan, 
and   the   Holy   Spirit,   to   be   all   and    equally 

manifestations  of  his   life  458 

His  instinct  of  immortality  is  indefinite  though 

strong    462 

Evolution    cannot    furnish    the    certainty    of    a 

happy  future   463 

Only  one  poem  shows  belief  in  a  righteous  God 

or  in  retribution  for  evil-doing  466 

"Heavenly  Death"  therefore  is  the  only  savior.  467 
Walt  Whitman  is  a  poet  only  in  the  sense  of 

giving  us  the  materials  for  poetry  468 

His  verse  divorces  liberty  from  law,  and  makes 
the   highest   poetry   impossible  469 


I 

WILLIAM  CULLEN  BRYANT 


WILLIAM  CULLEN  BRYANT 


THERE  are  patriotic  people  who  maintain  that 
America  is  the  predestined  home  of  poetry.  They 
point  to  little  Greece,  with  her  rocky  cliffs  and  bosky 
vales,  her  purple  hills  and  encircling  isles,  and  ask 
triumphantly  if  Greece  was  not  the  natural  habitat 
of  liberty  and  beauty.  When  we  assent,  they  argue 
a  fortiori  that  our  great  continent  was  even  more  mani- 
festly ordained  to  nourish  the  largest  and  most  precious 
growths  of  the  human  mind.  Poetry  is  one  of  those 
largest  and  most  precious  growths,  for  it  is  the  rhyth- 
mical expression  of  the  world's  meaning,  in  thoughts 
that  breathe  and  words  that  burn.  Poetry  therefore 
must  be  native  to  America. 

The  argument  would  do  credit  to  Henry  Thomas 
Buckle,  who  attributes  civilization  wholly  to  environ- 
ment. But  it  is  not  convincing.  Unfortunately,  per- 
haps, poetry  needs  for  its  production  something  more 
than  bigness  of  territory  or  sublimity  of  scenery. 
Switzerland  has  giant  and  snow-crowned  peaks,  but 
she  has  never  had  a  great  poet.  Our  own  mountain 
ranges  and  untrodden  forests,  our  prairie  cyclones  and 
river  floods,  furnish  proper  surroundings,  but  they 
do  not  furnish  the  needed  inspiration.  Our  struggles 
with  Indian  ferocity  and  British  tyranny,  our  combi- 

3 


4  POETRY    A    BELATED    PRODUCT    OF    AMERICA 

nation  of  civil  freedom  with  civil  union,  give  us  sub- 
jects for  poetry,  but  not  the  genius  to  treat  them.  A 
nation  of  Gradgrinds  would  still  value  Niagara  only 
for  its  water-power,  and  would  be  entirely  content  with 
prose. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  poetry  was  a  belated  product  of 
the  American  soil.  We  may  possibly  explain  this  by 
remembering  that 

The  Pilgrim  bands,  who  passed  the  sea  to  keep 
Their  Sabbaths  in  the  eye  of  God  alone, 
In  his  wide  temple  of  the  wilderness1 

were  Puritans  of  the  most  straitest  sect,  many  of 
whom  thought  love  for  nature  a  dangerous  rival  to 
love  for  God.  The  clearing  of  forests  and  the  fear  of 
savage  aggression,  moreover,  occupied  their  thoughts. 
The  Bay  Psalm  Book  was  the  nearest  approach  to 
poetical  expression,  and  that  was  wholly  religious. 
Grotesque  and  unmelodious  as  it  was,  it  witnessed  that 
the  instinct  of  poetry  still  survived,  and  that  men  can- 
not long  live  without  some  such  exercise  of  the  imagi- 
nation. Most  wonderful  it  is  that,  after  such  bare  and 
unpromising  beginnings,  there  should  have  suddenly 
appeared  the  true  father  of  American  literature,  the 
first  real  poet  of  our  Western  world.  We  wonder  when 
we  see  the  sun  of  Homer  rising  upon  the  darkness  of 
Hellenic  times;  we  may  quite  as  justly  wonder  when 
we  find  the  bizarre  and  tasteless  lines  of  Trumbull  and 
Barlow  succeeded  by  the  mature  and  lofty  verse  of 
William  Cullen  Bryant. 

Yet   even   this   prodigy   was    rooted   in    the   past. 

1  Bryant,  "  The  Burial-place." 


BRYANT  S    ANCESTRY  5 

Though  the  poetic  afflatus  was  an  original  and  divine 
endowment,  heredity  and  environment  prepared  the 
way  for  its  expression.  The  poet  came  of  a  sturdy 
New  England  stock.  His  father  and  his  father's 
father  were  physicians.  His  mother  was  a  woman  of 
energy  and  piety,  who  taught  her  son  to  love  and  to 
repeat  the  hymns  of  Isaac  Watts.  She  hated  drunken- 
ness and  lying.  The  father  was  a  born  naturalist.  He 
taught  his  son  botany  and  woodcraft,  as  well  as  love 
for  good  literature.  For  the  time  in  which  he  lived, 
Doctor  Bryant  was  a  man  of  large  and  liberal  mind. 
He  was  for  several  sessions  member  of  the  lower 
house  of  the  Massachusetts  Legislature,  and  once  at 
least  he  was  a  member  of  the  Senate.  His  visits  to 
Boston  and  his  acquaintance  with  public  men  made 
him  the  oracle  of  his  town,  though  his  serene  nature 
prevented  any  pretense  of  superiority.  He  was  careful 
of  his  dress,  and  was  sometimes  taken  for  a  city  resi- 
dent, spending  his  holiday  in  the  country.  His  physical 
strength  was  such  that,  though  not  of  great  stature, 
he  could  put  his  barrel  of  cider  over  the  wheel  into 
the  wagon.  Since  his  own  father  was  a  physician,  his 
ambition  was  to  have  a  son  who  should  be  a  physician 
also,  and  with  that  hope  he '  named  his  second  son 
William  Cullen,  after  the  then  celebrated  physician  of 
Edinburgh. 

The  boy  was  evidently  well  endowed  in  body.  His 
only  defect  in  childhood  seems  to  have  been  a  bigness 
of  head,  which  the  father  sought  to  reduce,  by  plung- 
ing him  each  morning  into  a  spring  of  cold  water.  He 
was  born  at  Cummington,  a  little  hamlet  hid  away 
among  the  Berkshire  hills  of  Western  Massachusetts. 


6  BIRTHPLACE    AND    EARLY    DISCIPLINE 

The  first  pioneer  had  built  his  cabin  there  only  thirty 
years  before,  and  it  was  in  a  log  house  that  William 
first  saw  the  light.  That  log  house  has  long  since 
vanished  from  the  scene,  but  the  tradition  of  it  still 
remains,,  in  spite  of  the  commodious  mansion  which 
after  a  time  took  its  place  and  became  the  poet's  coun- 
try resort. 

Robert  Burns  was  born  in  a  hovel,  but  Scottish 
minstrelsy  preceded  him.  William  Cullen  Bryant  owed 
more  than  Burns  to  his  early  education.  His  first 
schoolhouse  was  built  of  logs,  but  pedagogy  in  those 
days  meant  severe  discipline,  and  the  three  R's  were 
ground  into  the  very  fiber  of  his  being.  He  was  in- 
dustrious and  meditative.  His  natural  habit  of  seclu- 
sion was  fostered  by  the  presence  and  influence,  in  the 
family,  of  his  mother's  father,  Ebenezer  Snell,  an  awe- 
inspiring  patriarch,  who  frowned  on  all  frivolity  in 
the  children.  Grandfather  Snell  was  a  magistrate, 
under  whose  administration  Bryant  remembered  seeing 
forty  lashes  inflicted  upon  a  young  fellow  of  eighteen 
for  theft.  A  bundle  of  birchen  twigs  hung  beside  the 
chimney  of  the  old  log  house,  as  an  indispensable  part 
of  the  kitchen  furniture,  and  as  a  warning  to  evil-doers ; 
and  such  rods  boys  often  had  to  gather  for  their 
own  castigation.  But  there  were  also  books.  Bryant 
traced  back  his  poetical  gift  to  his  great-grandfather, 
Doctor  Howard,  who  had  opportunely  left  a  large  part 
of  his  library  to  his  descendants.  The  boy  devoured 
"  The  Pilgrim's  Progress  "  and  "  Robinson  Crusoe." 
Pope,  Gray,  and  Goldsmith  were  his  father's  posses- 
sions, and  these  served  to  mitigate  the  influence  of 
Anne  Bradstreet  and  other  New  England  poetasters. 


EDUCATIONAL   INFLUENCES  7 

We  must  not  forget  the  educational  influence  of  the 
times.  Though  Bryant  was  born  in  1794,  when  the 
war  of  the  Revolution  was  over,  the  survivors  of  that 
war  were  still  in  evidence,  and  stories  of  the  Boston 
Tea-party  and  of  Bunker  Hill,  of  Saratoga  and  Valley 
Forge,  were  the  chief  entertainments  of  the  fireside. 
There  was  no  theater  or  circus,  but  the  militia-muster, 
the  husking-bee,  the  apple-paring,  the  barn-raising,  and 
the  maple-sugar  camp  furnished  healthful  excitement 
to  the  young  folk  of  the  community.  The  love  of  coun- 
try flourished  side  by  side  with  the  love  of  nature. 
The  pulpit  of  that  day  dealt  only  with  great  themes. 
Heaven  and  hell  were  realities  that  gave  light  and  shade 
to  daily  life.  Men's  thoughts  of  the  outward  world 
and  of  civil  government  were  interpenetrated  by  their 
thoughts  of  God  and  of  immortality.  The  poetry  of 
that  age  must  needs  be  a  serious  poetry.  But  the  ma- 
terial was  there.  The  beauty  and  grandeur  of  nature, 
patriotic  pride  and  boundless  hope  for  the  country's 
future,  gratitude  to  God  for  freedom  and  faith  in  God's 
guidance  of  the  individual  and  of  the  State — what 
nobler  sources  of  poetic  inspiration  were  ever  found 
in  any  land  ? 

Bryant  was  a  natural  linguist.  At  sixteen  months, 
he  knew  all  the.  letters  of  the  alphabet.  At  the  age  of 
fourteen  he  began  Latin  with  his  uncle,  Rev.  Dr. 
Thomas  Snell,  of  Brookfield,  and  in  eighteen  months 
he  had  read  enough  Latin  to  fit  him  for  admission  to 
college  at  an  advanced  standing.  At  fifteen  he  began 
Greek  with  Rev.  Moses  Hallock,  of  Plainfield,  and  in 
two  months  he  had  read  through  the  whole  Greek 
Testament.  This  finished  his  preparatory  studies,  and 


8  LACK  OF  COLLEGE  TRAINING 

at  sixteen  years  of  age  he  entered  the  sophomore  class 
of  Williams  College.  But  shyness  of  nature  and 
straitness  of  finance  limited  his  stay  to  seven  months. 
He  left  college  indeed  with  the  hope  of  finishing  his 
course  at  Yale.  This  his  father's  means  did  not  permit. 
He  contented  himself  with  a  year  of  the  classics  and 
the  mathematics  with  his  father  at  home.  It  was  no 
bad  substitute  for  college  training,  and  Williams  Col- 
lege shortly  afterward  gave  him  his  degree.  To  the 
end  of  his  days  Bryant  recognized  his  indebtedness  to 
his  father.  The  father  must  have  perceived  his  son's 
bent  toward  literature,  for  we  read  of  no  more  effort  to 
make  him  a  physician.  Doctor  Bryant  was  himself 
inclined  to  the  making  of  verses,  and  classical  study 
had  taught  him  correctness  and  compression.  These 
qualities  of  style  the  father  communicated  to  the  son. 
In  after  years  the  poet,  mourning  his  father's  death, 
wrote  touchingly: 

For  he  is  in  his  grave  who  taught  my  youth 
The  art  of  verse,  and  in  the  bud  of  life 
Offered  me  to  the  Muses.2 

That  year  at  home,  under  parental  tutelage,  with 
freedom  to  roam  the  woods  and  meditate  upon  their 
lessons,  was  a  great  year  for  Bryant,  for  it  witnessed 
the  dawn  of  his  poetical  ambition.  His  mind  and  heart 
were  awakening,  and  he  himself  tells  us: 

I  cannot  forget  with  what  fervid  devotion 
I  worshiped  the  visions  of  verse  and  of  fame; 

Each  gaze  at  the  glories  of  .earth,  sky,  and  ocean, 
To  my  kindled  emotions,  was  wind  over  flame. 


2  "  Hymn  to  Death.' 


lt  SONGS    OF    THE    MOCKING-BIRD  "  9 

Till  I  felt  the  dark  power  o'er  my  reveries  stealing, 
From  the  gloom  of  the  thicket  that  over  me  hung, 

And  the  thoughts  that  awoke,  in  that  rapture  of  feeling, 
Were  formed  into  verse  as  they  rose  to  my  tongue.3 

In  his  later  years  he  gives  his  matured  conception 
of  his  calling  in  the  verses  entitled  "  The  Poet,"  and 
shows  us  that  poetic  inspiration  does  not  exclude 
careful  elaboration : 

Deem  not  the  framing  of  a  deathless  lay 
The  pastime  of  a  drowsy  summer  day. 

And  in  the  poem  named  "  A  Lifetime,"  he  dutifully 
connects  the  growth  of  his  own  mind  with  the  teach- 
ing of  his  father : 

He  murmurs  his  own  rude  verses 

As  he  roams  the  woods  alone; 
And  again  I  gaze  with  wonder, 

His  eyes  are  so  like  my  own. 

I  see  him  next  in  his  chamber, 
Where  he  sits  him  down  to  write 

The  rhymes  he  framed  in  his  ramble, 
And  he  cons  them  with  delight. 

A  kindly  figure  enters, 

A  man  of  middle  age, 
And  points  to  a  line  just  written, 
And  'tis  blotted  from  the  page. 

Bryant's  earliest  productions,  however,  were  only 
"  songs  of  the  mocking-bird,"  and  showed  no  signs  of 
originality.  All  the  more  wonderful  it  is,  that  in  his 
eighteenth  year  he  was  the  author  of  "  Thanatopsis," 

3  "  I   Cannot  Forget." 
C 


IO  THANATOPSIS 

a  poem  so  elevated  in  thought  and  so  faultless  in  dic- 
tion as  to  give  it  rank  with  the  world's  best  literature. 
"  Thanatopsis  "  was  at  first  a  fragment,  and  its  begin- 
nings go  back  to  the  poet's  sixteenth  year.  Up  to  that 
time  he  had  written  only  school-exercises,  some  of 
which  he  had  recited  to  little  audiences  in  the  school- 
house  ;  besides  these  there  was  one  college  poem,  which 
is  of  no  great  account  and  was  apparently  gotten  up  to 
order.  But  his  days  of  schooling  were  now  over.  He 
could  no  longer  be  dependent  upon  his  father ;  he  must 
shift  for  himself.  His  bent  to  poetry  did  not  prevent 
him  from  perceiving  that  literature  would  never  fur- 
nish him  with  a  living;  penury  has  indeed  been  well 
defined  as  the  wages  of  the  pen.  He  began  the  study 
of  the  law  at  Worthington  and  at  Bridgewater,  and 
at  the  age  of  twenty-one  was  admitted  to  the  bar  at 
Plymouth.  But  before  leaving  home  to  begin  these 
studies,  and  at  the  age  of  eighteen,  he  completed 
"  Thanatopsis,"  laid  it  aside,  and  apparently  forgot  it. 
In  his  absence,  Doctor  Bryant  rummaged  over  the 
contents  of  a  drawer  and  drew  forth  the  precious 
document.  After  reading  it  hastily,  he  gave  it  to  a 
lady  friend,  and  asked  her  to  pass  upon  its  merits. 
She  read  it,  and  burst  into  tears,  and  in  her  weeping 
the  doctor  soon  joined.  They  were  tears  of  joy,  for 
they  saluted  the  rise  above  the  horizon  of  our  first  poet, 
one  of  God's  greatest  gifts  to  the  New  World. 

Dana,  the  editor  of  the  "  North  American  Review," 
thought  it  could  not  have  been  written  by  an  American. 
The  wonder  of  it  was  that  a  youth  in  his  teens  could 
have  produced  a  poem  so  free  from  foreign  influence, 
yet  so  faultless  and  sublime.  Stoddard  has  called  it 


THANATOPSIS  II 

"  the  greatest  poem  ever  written  by  so  young  a  man." 
President  Mark  Hopkins  said  that  Bryant  "  had  the 
wisdom  of  age  in  his  youth,  and  the  fire  of  youth  in 
his  age."  I  have  spoken  of  "  Thanatopsis  "  as  "  so 
free  from  foreign  influences."  But  I  cannot  wholly 
agree  with  George  William  Curtis,  when  he  pro- 
nounces it  "  without  a  trace  of  the  English  masters  of 
the  hour."  Chadwick  is  more  nearly  correct,  when  he 
says  that  Henry  Kirke  White's  "Ode  to  the  Rose- 
mary," Bishop  Porteus's  "  Death,"  and  Blair's 
"  Grave  "  all  helped  to  shape  the  mood  out  of  which 
"  Thanatopsis  "  came.  To  my  mind  it  owes  yet  more 
to  the  example  and  inspiration  of  Wordsworth,  who 
began  to  print  before  Bryant  was  born.  We  know 
that  Judge  Howe,  at  Worthington,  found  Wordsworth 
in  Bryant's  hand,  and  warned  him  that  it  would  spoil 
his  style.  But,  thanks  to  his  own  native  gift,  Bryant 
had  his  own  style,  and  Wordsworth  only  stimulated 
and  encouraged  it. 

"  Thanatopsis "  is  a  poet's  vision  of  death.  The 
solemn  aspects  of  death  are  in  mind,  but  they  are  not 
funereal.  The  coming  of  the  inevitable  day  is  nothing 
dreaded.  It  is  the  appointed  end  of  earthly  life,  and 
its  lesson  is  expressed  in  the  closing  lines  of  the  poem : 

So  live,  that  when  thy  summons  conies  to  join 
The  innumerable  caravan,  which  moves 
To  that  mysterious  realm,  where  each  shall  take 
His  chamber  in  the  silent  halls  of  death, 
Thou  go  not,  like  the  quarry-slave  at  night, 
Scourged  to  his  dungeon;  but,  sustained  and  soothed 
By  an  unfaltering  trust,  approach  thy  grave, 
Like  one  who  wraps  the  drapery  of  his  couch 
About  him,  and  lies  down  to  pleasant  dreams, 


12  "  ODE    ON    BIRTHDAY    OF    WASHINGTON  " 

Early  maturity  is  often  the  precursor  of  early  decay. 
But  this  was  not  the  case  with  Bryant  His  genius 
was  a  perennial  plant,  and  he  bore  fruit  even  in  old 
age.  In  his  eightieth  year  he  wrote  his  "  Ode  on  the 
Birthday  of  George  Washington,"  of  which  John 
Bigelow  said  that  these  were  "  the  finest  verses  ever 
produced  by  one  so  young  and  yet  so  old."  In  some 
editions  this  ode  is  entitled  "  The  Twenty-second  of 
February."  As  it  is  brief,  I  quote  it  entire: 

Pale  is  the  February  sky, 
And  brief  the  midday's  sunny  hours; 
The  wind-swept  forest  seems  to  sigh 
For  the  sweet  time  of  leaves  and  flowers. 

Yet  has  no  month  a  prouder  day, 
Not  even  when  the  summer  broods 
O'er  meadows  in  their  fresh  array, 
Or  autumn  tints  the  glowing  woods. 

For  this  chill  season  now  again 
Brings,  in  its  annual  round,  the  morn 
When,  greatest  of  the  sons  of  men, 
Our  glorious  Washington  was  born. 

Lo,  where,  beneath  an  icy  shield, 
Calmly  the  mighty  Hudson  flows! 
By  snow-clad  fell  and  frozen  field, 
Broadening,  the  lordly  river  goes. 

The  wildest  storm  that  sweeps  through  space, 
And  rends  the  oak  with  sudden  force, 
Can  raise  no  ripple  on  his  face, 
Or  slacken  his  majestic  course. 

Thus,  'mid  the  wreck  of  thrones,  shall  live 
Unmarred,  undimmed,  our  hero's  fame, 
And  years  succeeding  years  shall  give 
Increase  of  honors  to  his  name. 


WIDE    STRETCH    OF    BRYANT'S    ACTIVITY  13 

This  poem,  written  just  before  Bryant  died,  suggests 
to  us  the  wide  stretch  of  his  poetical  activity,  and  its 
remarkable  influence  upon  American  literature.  That 
influence  covered  a  period  of  fifty-six  years.  Bryant's 
youth  was  the  time  of  Napoleon's  conquests,  and  of 
his  final  •  defeat  at  Waterloo.  He  lived  through  the 
reigns  of  Louis  Philippe  and  of  Napoleon  the  Third; 
through  our  war  of  1812  and  our  great  Civil  War; 
and  through  the  administrations  of  twelve  of  our 
American  presidents.  He  celebrated  Lincoln's  Procla- 
mation of  Emancipation,  and  he  expressed  in  pathetic 
verse  the  sorrow  of  the  nation  at  Lincoln's  death.  His 
poetry  never  changed  its  sober  and  thoughtful  air. 
The  lyric  and  the  impassioned  were  foreign  to  him. 
But  interpretations  of  natural  beauty  were  never  lack- 
ing. He  had  not  the  melody  of  Shelley,  nor  the  intro- 
spection of  Browning,  but  there  were  a  simplicity  and 
a  judicial  quality  about  his  verse  which  made  it  im- 
pressive and  convincing. 

Bryant's  youth  was  past  before  there  occurred  the 
so-called  Elizabethan  revival.  Chaucer  and  Shake- 
speare did  not  get  their  proper  hold  upon  him.  If 
he  had  models  at  all,  he  found  them  in  Cowper  and 
Wordsworth.  So  we  do  not  find  in  him  the  vast 
vocabulary  and  deep  acquaintance  with  human  passion 
that  are  so  marked  in  Shakespeare,  nor  even  Chau- 
cer's gaiety  and  breadth  of  sympathy.  The  stateliness 
of  Pope  and  the  somberness  of  Wordsworth  made  their 
mark  upon  him.  Yet  he  avoided  the  platitudinous 
sentiment  of  "  The  Excursion,"  and  the  artistic  moral- 
izing of  the  "  Essay  on  Man."  He  was  slow  to  print, 
and  quick  to  detect  doggerel.  While  his  verse  is  never 


14  CORYPHEUS    OF   AMERICAN    POETS 

brilliant  or  startling,  it  never  lacks  correctness,  both 
in  form  and  substance.  Its  sincerity  commends  it. 
We  can  never  say  of  Bryant,  as  has  been  said  of 
Wordsworth,  that  his  fame  would  be  greater  if  nine- 
tenths  of  his  writing  had  been  burned.  It  is  this  com- 
bination of  beauty  and  truth,  of  insight  into  nature's 
meanings  and  simplicity  in  the  expression  of  them,  that 
has  made  Bryant  the  teacher  and  corypheus  of  our 
American  poets. 

My  meaning  will  be  more  plain  if  I  quote  the  words 
of  Emerson  and  of  Longfellow.  These  great  writers 
had  Bryant's  verse  before  them  at  the  very  beginning 
of  their  literary  careers.  While  Bryant  was  born  in 
1794,  Emerson's  birth  was  in  1803,  and  Longfellow's 
in  1807.  Longfellow  writes:  "  He  was  my  master  in 
verse — ten  years  my  senior.  His  translations  from  the 
Spanish  rival  the  originals  in  beauty."  Emerson  adds, 
"  He  has  written  some  of  the  best  poetry  we  have  had 
in  America."  Yet  Bryant  did  not  devote  himself 
wholly  to  poetry.  The  study  of  the  law  was  followed 
by  the  practice  of  the  law,  and  he  could  undoubtedly 
have  succeeded  in  that  profession.  First  at  Plainfield, 
and  then  at  Great  Barrington,  legal  practice  occupied 
him  for  nine  whole  years.  During  this  period  his 
reputation  secured  for  him  both  readers  and  hearers. 
Harvard  invited  him  to  deliver  its  Phi  Beta  Kappa 
address,  and  he  responded  with  his  poem,  "  The 
Ages,"  a  thoughtful  review  of  the  progress  of  human 
society,  with  stirring  prophecy  of  the  coming  great- 
ness of  America.  He  writes: 

Europe  is  given  a  prey  to  sterner  fates 
And  writhes  in  shackles.  . 


THE    LAW    EXCHANGED    FOR    LETTERS  15 

But  thou,  my  country,  thou  shalt  never  fall, 
Save  with  thy  children — thy  maternal  care, 
Thy  lavish  love,  thy  blessings  showered  on  all — 
These  are  thy  fetters — seas  and  stormy  air 
Are  the  wide  barrier  of  thy  borders,  where, 
Among  thy  gallant  sons  who  guard  thee  well, 
Thou  laugh'st  at  enemies:  who  shall  then  declare 
The  date  of  thy  deep-founded  strength,  or  tell 
How  happy,  in  thy  lap,  the  sons  of  men  shall  dwell! 

But  the  law  was  not  his  chosen  vocation.  He  be- 
came disgusted  with  the  technicality  and  chicanery 
which  often  accompanied  its  practice.  He  saw  himself 

forced  to  drudge  for  the  dregs  of  men, 
And  scrawl  strange  words  with  the  barbarous  pen, 
And  mingle  among  the  jostling  crowd, 
Where  the  sons  of  strife  are  subtle  and  loud.* 

He  longed  for  an  opening  into  some  form  of  literary 
activity.  This  was  furnished  him  in  the  city  of  New 
York,  where,  after  a  year  of  work  upon  a  purely 
literary  and  short-lived  review,  he  became,  first,  asso- 
ciate editor,  and  then  chief  editor  and  owner,  of  "  The 
Evening  Post." 

The  change  from  country  to  city  was  a  momentous 
one.  Yet  the  New  York  of  1825  was  not  the  New 
York  of  to-day.  It  numbered  only  180,000  inhabitants, 
and  the  city  extended  no  farther  north  than  Fourth 
Street.  Bryant  found  much  of  country  scenery  within 
easy  reach,  for  he  tells  us  that  he  delighted  to  ramble 
along  the  wooded  shores  of  the  Hudson  above  Canal 
Street.  The  city,  indeed,  was  solidly  built  only  so  far 
as  Canal.  City  life  was  not  yet  differentiated  from  the 

*  "  Green  River." 


l6  EDITOR    OF    "  THE    EVENING    POST  " 

life  of  the  country.  Though  the  poet  was  a  lawyer, 
with  nine  years'  experience  of  litigation  and  of  ming- 
ling with  his  kind,  he  was  by  nature  a  modest  man, 
and  he  hated  publicity.  In  Great  Barrington  he  had 
held  the  positions  of  tithing-man,  town  clerk,  and 
justice  of  the  peace,  with  an  aggregate  compensation 
of  five  dollars  a  year  for  all  the  three.  For  obvious 
reasons  he  afterward  declined  public  office.  In  the 
great  city  he  gave  himself  strictly  to  his  business  as 
editor.  For  forty-six  years  he  followed  what  he 
regarded  as  his  peculiar  calling.  He  did  more  than 
any  other  man  to  elevate  the  tone  of  American  journal- 
ism. It  greatly  needed  elevating,  as  Dickens  and  Trol- 
lope  have  shown  us  to  our  sorrow. 

No  one  who  has  reached  the  age  of  seventy  can 
remember  without  shame  the  personalities  and  vulgari- 
ties of  the  daily  press  of  fifty  years  ago.  Bryant  dealt 
with  principles  rather  than  with  persons.  He  was  at 
first  a  Federalist,  because  he  feared  the  Jeffersonian 
tendency  to  sectionalism  and  individualism.  After  a 
time  he  became  an  advocate  of  Free  Trade,  because 
he  detested  all  restrictions  upon  commerce;  indeed,  he 
demonstrated  his  independence  of  judgment  and  the 
courage  of  his  convictions  by  standing  many  years  for 
Free  Trade  when  in  all  the  country  he  was  its  only 
advocate.  The  same  general  principle  of  liberty  under 
law,  that  made  him  first  a  Federalist  and  then  a  Demo- 
crat, led  him  at  last,  when  the  slavery  agitation  began, 
to  take  sides  with  the  Republican  party,  and  with  that 
party  he  continued  to  act  through  the  remainder  of 
his  life.  He  was  no  doctrinaire,  like  Greeley,  and  he 
had  not  the  sarcastic  and  bitter  pen  of  Godkin,  his 


THE    JOURNALIST    AND    CITIZEN  17 

successor ;  but  he  was  an  almost  ideal  editor,  for  sound 
judgment  and  ability  to  guide  public  opinion. 

We  owe  him  a  great  debt.  If  we  abhor  yellow 
journalism,  it  is  because  he  set  for  us  the  true  standard. 
He  did  not  cater  to  popular  taste,  but  aimed  to  form 
that  taste.  Not  simply  news,  but  leadership;  not  mere 
reflection  of  the  good  and  evil  of  the  day,  but  incul- 
cation of  right  views  in  politics,  art,  and  conduct — 
these  were  his  aims.  He  loved  his  work  as  editor, 
because  it  was  so  impersonal.  He  could  teach  men  to 
weigh  reasons,  instead  of  being  led  by  passion  and 
prejudice.  But  he  could  not  be  hid.  He  became 
known  as  the  first  suggester  of  the  present  park  system 
of  New  York,  and  his  statue  now  very  properly  stands 
behind  the  new  building  of  the  Public  Library,  and 
facing  the  park  which  bears  his  name.  He  was  the 
founder  of  the  Century  Club,  and  its  president  when 
he  died.  He  was  also  the  founder  of  the  National 
Academy  of  Design.  He  was  called  upon  for  ad- 
dresses in  commemoration  of  Cole  the  painter,  of 
Cooper  the  novelist,  of  Washington  Irving,  Samuel 
F.  B.  Morse,  Shakespeare,  Scott,  Halleck,  and  last  of 
all,  Mazzini.  Indeed,  it  was  just  after  his  address  in 
honor  of  Mazzini  that,  on  entering  the  house  of  a 
friend,  "  that  good  gray  head  that  all  men  knew  "  fell 
backward  and  struck  the  stone  pavement,  so  that  four- 
teen days  afterward  Bryant  expired. 

It  is  calculated  that  his  editorial  writing,  during  the 
half-century  of  his  connection  with  "  The  Evening 
Post,"  would  fill  a  hundred  octavo  volumes  of  five  hun- 
dred pages  each.  He  wrote  upon  manifold  subjects 
of  politics,  history,  biography,  travel,  art;  but  always 


1 8      PHYSICAL    CONDITIONS    OF    BRYANT'S    ENERGY 

with  pellucid  clearness  and  straightforwardness,  and 
with  a  view  to  immediate  effect.  He  went  seven  times 
to  -Europe,  and  made  one  stay  of  two  years  abroad. 
He  was  a  scholar  in  several  languages,  and  made  trans- 
lations from  Greek,  Latin,  Italian,  Spanish,  and  French 
poems.  He  recited  Dante  in  Italian,  to  match  Zachos's 
recitation  of  Greek.  He  engaged  in  no  financial  specu- 
lations, and  he  never  sold  his  editorial  influence  to  any 
man  or  to  any  party.  But  he  was  all  the  more  recog- 
nized as  the  leader  of  the  American  press,  and  his 
business  sagacity  and  success  were  so  great  that  at  his 
death  he  left  to  his  family  a  fortune  of  half  -a  million 
dollars. 

We  cannot  understand  this  untiring  energy  without 
some  knowledge  of  its  physical  conditions.  Bryant 
had  one  of  those  calm  natures  to  which  work  seems 
easy  and  inevitable.  There  were  no  idle  hours.  Indus- 
try was  bred  in  the  bone.  He  tells  us  that  his  regular 
practice  was  to  rise  at  five  in  summer,  and  at  half  past 
five  in  winter;  to  spend  the  first  hour  of  the  day  in 
gymnastic  exercise ;  then  to  bathe ;  to  breakfast  mainly 
on  cereals;  to  avoid  tea  and  coffee  altogether;  to  walk 
three  miles  each  morning  to  his  office,  and  to  reach 
that  office  by  eight  o'clock.  The  afternoon  journal 
necessitated  early  hours  in  its  editor.  When  his  edi- 
torial work  was  over,  he  walked  home  again.  But 
he  took  no  office  cares  with  him.  He  lived  two  lives. 
When  the  life  of  the  editor  closed  with  the  day,  the 
life  of  the  poet  began.  His  house  at  Roslyn  on  Long 
Island  was  a  rural  retreat,  with  forty  acres  of  lawns 
and  trees  and  shrubs  and  flowers  about  it.  But  within 
was  a  librarv  of  several  thousand  books,  the  sifted  and 


CHARACTER  FOUNDED  IN  BELIEF  IN  GOD     19 

garnered  wisdom  and  product  of  the  ages.  Here  he 
luxuriated,  and  received  many  a  distinguished  guest. 
And  here  he  continued  to  write  poetry,  though  the 
pruning-knife  and  the  waste-basket  made  the  final 
product  small.  Toward  the  close  of  his  life  it  was  only 
on  great  occasions  that  he  spent  a  night  in  his  city 
house.  Public  dinners  always  sought  him,  and  he  fre- 
quently attended  them.  He  was  not  a  vegetarian, 
though  he  ate  little  meat;  he  was  not  a  total  abstainer, 
but  his  taking  of  wine  was  very  rare  and  very  sparing. 
He  never  used  tobacco,  though  he  provided  it  for  his 
friends.  At  the  age  of  eighty,  though  "  a  million 
wrinkles  carved  his  skin,"  his  senses  of  sight  and  of 
hearing  were  as  perfect  as  when  he  was  a  boy.  He 
never  wore  spectacles,  and  he  was  never  confined  to 
his  bed  by  illness.  His  only  answer,  as  to  the  secret 
of  this  wonderful  endurance,  was  the  one  word,  "  Mod- 
eration." 

But  he  was  more  than  an  editor,  and  more  than  a 
poet;  he  was  a  man.  The  foundation  of  his  indomi- 
table character  was  his  belief  in  God.  He  was  not  given 
to  voluble  expression  of  his  feelings;  he  thought,  not 
altogether  wisely,  as  I  think,  that  a  gentleman  should 
never  talk  of  his  religion  or  of  his  love-affairs.  We 
have  few  glimpses  of  his  inner  life,  except  those  which 
are  furnished  by  his  poems.  His  actions,  however, 
speak  louder  than  words.  In  his  family,  every  Sunday 
morning,  there  was  the  reading  of  a  chapter  of  the 
Bible  and  of  prayers.  He  was,  from  his  youth  to  his 
age,  an  invariable  attendant  upon  the  Sunday  services 
of  the  church.  In  New  England  he  worshiped  with 
the  Congregationalists,  on  Long  Island  with  Presby- 


2O  RELIGIOUS    HABITS 

terians,  in  the  city  of  New  York  with  Unitarians.  But 
he  never  ventured  to  make  a  Christian  profession  until 
his  later  years.  Mr.  Curtis  has  told  so  beautifully  the 
story  of  this  epoch  in  his  life,  that  I  quote  his  words : 

"The  poem  called  'The  Life  that  Is,'  dated  at  Castella- 
mare,  in  May,  1858,  commemorates  the  recovery  of  his  wife 
from  a  serious  illness.  A  little  time  before,  in  the  month  of 
April,  after  a  long  walk  with  his  friend,  the  Reverend  Mr. 
Waterston,  of  Boston,  on  the  shore  of  the  Bay  of  Naples,  he 
spoke  with  softened  heart  of  the  new  beauty  that  he  felt  in 
the  old  truth,  and  proposed  to  his  friend  to  baptize  him. 
With  prayer  and  hymn  and  spiritual  meditation,  a  little  com- 
pany of  seven,  says  Mr.  Waterston,  in  a  large  upper  room,  as 
in  the  Christian  story,  partook  of  the  Communion,  and  with 
his  good  gray  head  bowed  down,  Bryant  was  baptized." 

In  the  painted  window  which  commemorates  the 
ministry  of  Frederick  W.  Robertson  in  Brighton,  Eng- 
land, there  is  a  representation  of  Jesus 'at  the  age  of 
twelve  before  the,  doctors  in  the  temple,  and  with  this 
inscription,  "  They  were  thinking  about  theology ;  he 
about  religion."  Bryant  dealt  with  religion.  He 
was  no  professed  theologian.  Yet  every  man  has  some 
theology,  whether  he  be  conscious  of  it  or  not.  Some 
conceptions  of  truth  lie  at  the  basis  of  his  moral  action, 
and  the  more  thoughtful  and  logical  he  is,  the  more 
clear  and  articulate  will  these  conceptions  be.  A  mind 
'  so  vigorous  and  honest  as  Bryant's  could  not  help  ex- 
pressing itself  in  forms  of  speech ;  and  though  he  was 
shy  of  utterance  with  regard  to  the  deepest  things  of 
the  soul,  his  poetic  nature  could  not  be  satisfied  with- 
out putting  into  verse  that  which  to  him  was  most 
fundamental.  Many  of  his  poems,  indeed,  seem  writ- 
ten by  way  of  gradual  approach  to  a  Christian  con- 


BRYANT   AND    WORDSWORTH  21 

fession,  and  to  be  glad  and  solemn  avenues  leading  on- 
ward and  upward  to  the  holy  of  holies  and  to  the 
dwelling-place  of  God. 


II 


I  regard  Bryant  as  a  more  truly  Christian  poet  than 
even  Wordsworth.  Both  were  poets  of  nature.  But 
Wordsworth  came  near  to  identifying  God  with 
nature:  Bryant  never  confounded  the  two.  Words- 
worth would  never  have  found  delight  in  mountain, 
field,  and  flood,  if  he  had  not  recognized  in  them  a 
Spirit  which  through  them  manifested  itself  to  mortals. 
That  Spirit,  however,  never  seems  to  utter  articulate 
sounds,  or  to  take  personal  form.  But  to  Bryant,  God 
was  never  mere  impersonal  spirit.  "  It  "  and  "  which  " 
were  not  applicable  to  Him.  God  was  transcendent, 
even  more  than  he  was  immanent.  The  finite  was 
never  merged  in  the  infinite.  Mortal  awe  never  be- 
came pantheistic  absorption.  In  all  this  we  see  the 
abiding  influence  of  the  poet's  New  England  training, 
and  the  happy  effect  of  those  theological  sermons  to 
which  he  listened  in  his  youth. 

What  theology  we  find  in  Bryant's  poetry  must  then 
be  gathered  from  occasional  utterances  of  the  overflow- 
ing heart,  rather  than  from  any  set  effort  to  declare 
dogmatic  truth.  When  we  do  find  such  utterances,  we 
may  be  sure  that  they  will  be  clear  indications  of  his 
inmost  thought,  and  not  diplomatic  concessions  to  the 
spirit  of  the  times.  He  believed,  first  of  all,  in  a  per- 


22       CLEAR  FAITH  IN  A  PERSONAL  GOD 

sonal  God,  and  a  God  of  lov^e.  This  faith  delivered 
him  from  melancholy,  and  made  him  optimistic.  In 
this  respect  he  was  a  contrast  to  Matthew  Arnold,  to 
whom  God  was  only  "  the  power,  not  ourselves,  that 
makes  for  righteousness."  One  of  the  most  astound- 
ing announcements  in  all  literature  is  Matthew  Arnold's 
assertion  that  this  is  the  teaching  of  the  Hebrew  Scrip- 
tures. Without  a  personal  God,  the  forward-looking 
spirit  of  Israel  would  be  inexplicable.  It  is  easy  to  see 
the  truth  of  Hutton's  remark  that  Matthew  Arnold 
embodies  in  his  verse  "  the  sweetness,  the  gravity,  the 
strength,  the  beauty,  and  the  languor  of  death."  Bry- 
ant's verse  has  sweetness  and  gravity,  but  these  are  the 
sweetness  and  gravity  of  true  life,  derived  from  the 
divine  source  of  life,  and  sustained  thereby.  The 
solemn  joy  of  Bryant  has  its  analogue,  not  in  the  noc- 
turne of  Chopin,  but  in  the  largo  of  Handel. 

Our  poet  saw  God  in  the  beauty  and  grandeur  of 
the  world.  Woods,  waves,  and  sky  were  vocal  with 
praise  of  their  great  Author.  Bryant  was  not  ignorant 
of  science,  but  he  wished  to  join  science  to  faith.  Some 
of  his  noblest  poetry  is  the  expression  of  spontaneous 
emotion  in  presence  of  God's  sublime  manifestations  in 
nature.  "  A  Forest  Hymn  "  illustrates  this  character- 
istic of  his  verse : 

The  groves  were  God's  first  temples.    Ere  man  learned 

To  hew  the  shaft,  and  lay  the  architrave, 

And  spread  the  roof  above  them — ere  he  framed 

The  lofty  vault,  to  gather  and  roll  back 

The  sound  of  anthems;  in  the  darkling  wood, 

Amidst  the  cool  and  silence,  he  knelt  down, 

And  offered  to  the  Mightiest  solemn  thanks 

And  supplication. 


GOD   IN    NATURE  S  GRANDEUR  23 

"A  Hymn  of  the  Sea"  gives  us,  in  a  similar  man- 
ner, the  poet's  recognition  of  God's  presence  in  "  old 
ocean's  gray  and  melancholy  waste  " : 

The  sea  is  mighty,  but  a  mightier  sways 

His  restless  billows.    Thou,  whose  hands  have  scooped 

His  boundless  gulfs  and  built  his  shore,  thy  breath, 

That  moved  in  the  beginning  o'er  his  face, 

Moves  o'er  it  evermore. 

So  too,  there  is  a  "  Song  of  the  Stars,"  in  which 
the  heavenly  spheres  are  called 

The  boundless  visible  smile  of  Him 

To  the  veil  of  whose  brow  your  lamps  are  dim. 

Over  against  God's  creatorship  and  omnipresence, 
Bryant  recognizes  the  sinfulness  of  humanity: 

When,  from  the  genial  cradle  of  our  race, 
Went  forth  the  tribes  of  men  .  .  . 

.  .  .  and  there  forgot 

The  truth  of  heaven,  and  kneeled  to  gods  that  heard 
them  not.5 

The  world 

Is  full  of  guilt  and  misery,  .  . 
Enough  of  all  its  sorrows,  crimes,  and  cares, 
To  tire  thee  of  it.6 

Ha!  how  the  murmur  deepens!    I  perceive 
And  tremble  at  its  dreadful  import.     Earth 
Uplifts  a  general  cry  for  guilt  and  wrong, 
And  heaven  is  listening.7 

There  seems  to  be  confession  of  his  personal  sin : 

6  "  The  Ages."  8  "  Inscription  for  the  Entrance  to  a  Wood." 

»  "  Earth." 


24  SINFULNESS   OF   HUMANITY 

For  me,  the  sordid  cares  in  which  I  dwell 
Shrink  and  consume  my  heart,  as  heat  the  scroll; 
And  wrath  has  left  its  scar — that  fire  of  hell 
Has  left  its  frightful  scar  upon  my  soul.8 

"  The  West  Wind "   is  a  symbol  of  human  incon- 
stancy and  ingratitude : 

Ah!  thou  art  like  our  wayward  race; — 

When  not  a  shade  of  pain  or  ill 
Dims  the  bright  smile  of  Nature's  face, 

Thou  lov'st  to  sigh  and  mutmur  still. 

'He  regrets  his  forgetfulness  of  the  "Yellow  Violet": 

So  they,  who  climb  to  wealth,  forget 
The  friends  in  darker  fortunes  tried; 

I  copied  them — but  I  regret 
That  I  should  ape  the  ways  of  pride. 

"  The  African  Chief  "  depicts  the  cruelty  of  the  sav- 

Chained  in  the  market-place  he  stood, 
A  man  of  giant  frame. 

But  his  appeals  for  mercy  are  in  vain : 

His  heart  was  broken — crazed  his  brain: 

At  once  his  eye  grew  wild; 
He  struggled  fiercely  with  his  chain, 

Whispered,  and  wept,  and  smiled; 
Yet  wore  not  long  those  fatal  bands, 

And  once,  at  shut  of  day, 
They  drew  him  forth  upon  the  sands, 

The  foul  hyena's  prey. 

Human  sinfulness  touches  the  divine  compassion  in 
Bryant's  verse.     He   sees  in   "  The  Fountain,"   that 

8  "  The  Future  Life." 


THE   DIVINE    COMPASSION  2$ 

springs  "  from  the  red  mould  and  slimy  roots  of  earth," 
the  symbol  of  God's  grace : 

Thus  doth  God 
Bring,  from  the  dark  and  foul,  the  pure  and  bright. 

And  in  "  The  Ages  "  he  asks : 

Has  nature,  in  her  calm,  majestic  march, 
Faltered  with  age  at  last?  .  . 

Look  on  this  beautiful  world,  and  read  the  truth 

In  her  fair  page. 

.  .  .  Eternal  Love  doth  keep, 
In  his  complacent  arms,  the  earth,  the  air,  the  deep. 

Will  then  the  merciful  One,  who  stamped  our  race 

With  his  own  image,  .  . 
.  .  .  leave  a  work  so  fair  all  blighted  and  accursed? 

Oh,  no!  a  thousand  cheerful  omens  give 
Hope  of  yet  happier  days,  whose  dawn  is  nigh. 
He  who  has  tamed  the  elements,  shall  not  live 
The  slave  of  his  own  passions;  he  whose  eye 
Unwinds  the  eternal  dances  of  the  sky, 
And  in  the  abyss  of  brightness  dares  to  span 
The  sun's  broad  circle,  rising  yet  more  high, 
In  God's  magnificent  works  his  will  shall  scan — 
And  love  and  peace  shall  make  their  paradise  with  man. 

The  poet's  sympathy  with  nature  is  connected  with 
his  Puritan  belief  in  man's  fall.  The  external  world  is 
beautiful,  because  unfallen.  It  shares  with  man  the 
effects  of  sin;  but,  whenever  we  retreat  from  the 
regions  which  man's  folly  has  despoiled,  we  may  find 
something  which  reminds  us  of  our  lost  paradise. 
From  the  wrath  and  injustice  of  man,  the  Puritans  fled 
to  the  untrodden  wilderness,  and  in  its  solitudes  they 


26  THE   BEAUTIFUL   UNFALLEN    WORLD 

found  a  sanctuary.  In  the  "  Inscription  for  the  En- 
trance to  a  Wood,"  we  read : 

The  primal  curse 

Fell,  it  is  true,  upon  the  unsinning  earth, 
But  not  in  vengeance.    God  hath  yoked  to  guilt 
Her  pale  tormentor,  misery. 

And  so  all  things  work  together  for  good,  even 
though  for  the  present  they  may  seem  to  contradict 
the  divine  beneficence.  Bryant's  "  Hymn  to  Death  " 
makes  even  that  grim  messenger  to  be  the  protector 
of  God's  creatures : 

Thus,  from  the  first  of  time,  hast  thou  been  found 
On  virtue's  side;  the  wicked,  but  for  thee, 
Had  been  too  strong  for  the  good;  the  great  of  earth 
Had  crushed  the  weak  forever. 

The  "  Hymn  of  the  Waldenses  "  declares  the  justice 
of  God: 

Hear,  Father,  hear  thy  faint  afflicted  flock 
Cry  to  thee,  from  the  desert  and  the  rock.  .  . 

Thou,  Lord,  dost  hold  the  thunder;  the  firm  land 
Tosses  in  billows  when  it  feels  thy  hand.  .  . 

Yet,  mighty  God,  yet  shall  thy  frown  look  forth 
Unveiled,  and  terribly  shall  shake  the  earth. 

But  justice  is  mixed  with  love.  He  translates,  from 
the  Provencal  of  Bernard  Rascas,  the  magnificent 
lines : 

All  things  that  are  on  earth  shall  wholly  pass  away, 
Except  the  love  of  God,  which  shall  live  and  last  for  aye. 
The  forms  of  men  shall  be  as  they  had  never  been; 
The  blasted  groves  shall  lose  their  fresh  and  tender  green; 


DIVINE   JUSTICE   AND   LOVE  27 

And  the  great  globe  itself,  so  the  holy  writings  tell, 
With  the  rolling  firmament,  where  the  starry  armies  dwell, 
Shall  melt  with  fervent  heat — they  shall  all  pass  away, 
Except  the  love  of  God,  which  shall  live  and  last  for  aye. 

And  from  Boethius,  on  "  The  Order  of  Nature  " : 

Thou  who  wouldst  read,  with  an  undarkened  eye, 
The  laws  by  which  the  Thunderer  bears  sway, 

Look  at  the  stars  that  keep,  in  yonder  sky, 
Unbroken  peace  from  Nature's  earliest  day. 

Love  binds  the  parts  together,  gladly  still 

They  court  the  kind  restraint,  nor  would  be  free; 

Unless  Love  held  them  subject  to  the  Will 
That  gave  them  being,  they  would  cease  to  be. 

This  love  cares  for  the  individual,  as  well  as  for  the 
great  whole  over  which  it  rules.  The  poet,  in  "  The 
Crowded  Street,"  cannot  think  any  human  soul  for- 
gotten : 

Each,  where  his  tasks  or  pleasures  call, 
They  pass,  and  heed  each  other  not. 
There  is  who  heeds,  who  holds  them  all, 
In  his  large  care  and  boundless  thought. 

These  struggling  tides  of  life  that  seem 
In  wayward,  aimless  course  to  tend, 

Are  eddies  of  the  mighty  stream 
That  rolls  to  an  appointed  end. 

There  was  a  vein  of  humor  in  Bryant,  which  seldom 
came  to  the  surface,  but  which  his  associates  sometimes 
discovered.  He  invites  his  pastor,  Doctor  Dewey,  to 
come  with  Mrs.  Dewey  and  visit  him  at  his  country- 
seat  on  Long  Island : 

The  season  wears  an  aspect  glum  and  glummer, 
The  icy  north  wind,  an  unwelcome  comer, 
Frighting  from  garden  walks  each  pretty  hummer, 


28  A   VEIN   OF   HUMOR 

Whose  murmuring  music  lulled  the  noons  of  summer, 

Roars  in  the  wood.s,  with  grummer  voice  and  grummer, 

And  thunders  in  the  forest  like  a  drummer. 

Dumb  are  the  birds — they  could  not  well  be  dumber; 

The  winter-cold,  life's  pitiless  benumber, 

Bursts  water-pipes,  and  makes  us  call  the  plumber. 

Now,  by  the  fireside,  toils  the  patient  thumber 

Of  ancient  books,  and  no  less  patient  summer 

Of  long  accounts,  while  topers  fill  the  rummer, 

The  maiden  thinks  what  furs  will  best  become  her, 

And  on  the  stage-boards  shouts  the  gibing  mummer. 

Shut  in  by  storms,  the  dull  piano-strummer 

Murders  old  tunes.    There's  nothing  wearisomer! 

This  rhyming  would  have  done  credit  to  Browning 
or  Lowell.  But  Bryant's  humor  appeared  more  often 
in  his  editorial  work  than  in  his  poetry.  A  witty 
opponent  said  that  his  articles  always  began  with  a 
stale  joke,  and  ended  with  a  fresh  lie — an  accusation 
which  only  shows  how  greatly  the  journalism  of  the 
day  needed  reformation. 

No  stanza  of  all  Bryant's  writing  is  better  known 
or  more  often  quoted  than  that  from  the  poem  en- 
titled "  The  Battle-field  " : 

Truth,  crushed  to  earth,  shall  rise  again; 

Th'  eternal  years  of  God  are  hers; 
But  Error,  wounded,  writhes  in  pain, 

And  dies  among  his  worshipers. 

This  verse  has  been  criticized,  as  holding  to  some 
power  of  impersonal  truth  to  conquer  the  world.  In 
the  light  of  our  poet's  other  utterances,  I  must  think 
this  criticism  unjust.  Truth  is  personified  only  by 
poetic  license.  It  has  power  only  because  it  has  God 
behind  it,  and  because  it  is  the  very  nature  of  God 


TRUTH    AND   FREEDOM    NOT   IMPERSONAL  2Q 

himself.    And  so  I  must  interpret  those  noble  lines  in 
"  My  Autumn  Walk,"  in  which  Bryant  exclaims : 

Oh,  for  that  better  season, 
When  the  pride  of  the  foe  shall  yield, 

And  the  hosts  of  God  and  Freedom 
March  back  from  the  well-won  field! 

The  hosts  of  truth  and  freedom  are  only  the  agents 
and  instruments  of  God. 

This  persistent  theism  characterizes  his  short  and 
fanciful,  as  well  as  his  longer  and  more  serious  pro- 
ductions. I  know  of  no  more  beautiful  celebration  of 
divine  Providence  than  that  of  Bryant's  address  "  To 
a  Waterfowl."  It  brings  down  God's  care  into  the 
affairs  of  individual  life : 

Whither,  midst  falling  dew," 

While  glow  the  heavens  with  the  last  steps  of  day, 
Far,  through  their  rosy  depths,  dost  thou  pursue 

Thy  solitary  way? 

Vainly  the  fowler's  eye 

Might  mark  thy  distant  flight  to  do  thee  wrong, 
As,  darkly  seen  against  the  crimson  sky, 

Thy  figure  floats  along. 

Seek'st  thou  the  plashy  brink 
Of  weedy  lake,  or  marge  of  river  wide, 
Or  where  the  rocking  billows  rise  and  sink 

On  the  chafed  ocean-side? 

There  is  a  Power  whose  care 
Teaches  thy  way  along  that  pathless  coast — 
The  desert  and  illimitable  air — 

Lone  wandering,  but  riot  lost. 

All  day  thy  wings  have  fanned, 
At  that  far  height,  the  cold,  thin  atmosphere, 
Yet  stoop  not,  weary,  to  the  welcome  land, 

Though  the  dark  night  is  near. 


3O  "  TO    A    WATERFOWL 

And  soon  that  toil  shall  end; 
Soon  shalt  thou  find  a  summer  home,  and  rest, 
And  scream  among  thy  fellows;  reeds  shall  bend, 

Soon,  o',er  thy  sheltered  nest. 

Thou'rt  gone,  the  abyss  of  heaven 
Hath  swallowed  up  thy  form;  yet,  on  my  heart 
Deeply  has  sunk  the  lesson  thou  hast  given, 

And  shall  not  soon  depart. 

He  who,  from  zone  to  zone, 

Guides  through  the  boundless  sky  thy  certain  flight, 
In  the  long  way  that  I  must  tread  alone, 

Will  lead  my  steps  aright. 

These  lines  were  written  in  the  poet's  youth,  when 
the  world  was  all  before  him  where  to  choose,  and 
when  competence  and  success  were  far  away.  They  are 
as  perfect  in  diction  as  they  are  in  faith.  Matthew 
Arnold  agreed  with  Hartley  Coleridge  in  pronouncing 
"  The  Waterfowl  "  the  finest  short  poem  in  the  English 
language.  I  discern  the  same  pure  and  trustful  spirit 
in  his  poem  entitled  "  Blessed  are  they  that  Mourn." 
The  Providence  that  gives  us  days  of  gladness  does 
not  forget  us  in  our  days  of  sorrow : 

Oh,  deem  not  they  are  blest  alone 

Whose  lives  a  peaceful  tenor  keep; 
The  Power  who  pities  man,  hath  shown 

A  blessing  for  the  eyes  that  weep. 

The  light  of  smiles  shall  fill  again 

The  lids  that  overflow  with  tears; 
And  weary  hours  of  woe  and  pain 

Are  promises  of  happier  years. 

There  is  a  day  of  sunny  rest 

For  every  dark  and  troubled  night: 

And  grief  may  bide  an  evening  guest, 
But  joy  shall  come  with  early  light. 


BRYANT    A    CHRISTIAN  3! 

And  thou,  who,  o'er  thy  friend's  low  bier, 

Dost  shed  the  bitter  drops  like  rain, 
Hope  that  a  brighter,  happier  sphere 

Will  give  him  to  thy  arms  again. 

Nor  let  the  good  man's  trust  depart, 
Though  life  its  common  gifts  deny, — 

Though  with  a  pierced  and  bleeding  heart, 
And  spurned  of  men,  he  goes  to  die. 

For  God  hath  marked  each  sorrowing  day, 

And  numbered  every  secret  tear, 
And  heaven's  long  age  of  bliss  shall  pay 

For  all  his  children  suffer  here. 


William  Cullen  Bryant  was  a  Christian.  He  de- 
clared his  entire  reliance  on  Christ  for  salvation.  I 
do  not  know  that  his  faith  would  have  answered  to  the 
ordinary  dogmatic  standards,  but  it  was  certainly 
strong  enough  to  lead  him  to  confession  and  to  bap- 
tism. He  knew  his  own  weakness  and  insufficiency, 
and  he  trusted  in  what  God  had  done  for  him,  and 
what  God  would  do  for  him,  in  Jesus  Christ.  In  his 
Phi  Beta  Kappa  poem  at  Harvard,  he  showed 

How  vain, 

Instead  of  the  pure  heart  and  innocent  hands, 
Are  all  the  proud  and  pompous  modes  to  gain 
The  smile  of  Heaven. 

It  is  not  generally  known  that  he  wrote  hymns  for 
public  worship,  for  not  all  of  these  are  included  in 
most  editions  of  his  works.  But  Symington,  in  his 
biography,  quotes  for  us  two  stanzas  of  a  hymn 
founded  on  the  saying  of  Mary,  the  mother  of  Jesus, 
at  the  marriage  in  Cana  of  Galilee : 


32  BRYANT   A    HYMN-WRITER 

Whate'er  he  bids  observe  and  do; 

Such  be  the  law  that  we  obey, 
And  greater  wonders  men  shall  view 

Than  that  of  Cana's  bridal  day. 

The  flinty  heart  with  love  shall  beat, 
The  chains  shall  fall  from  passion's  slave, 

The  proud  shall  sit  at  Jesus'  feet 

And  learn  the  truths  that  bless  and  save. 

His  published  works  do,  however,  furnish  us  with 
another  hymn  which  bears  the  title,  "  Receive  Thy 
Sight,"  and  is  a  metrical  version  of  the  Gospel  story : 

When  the  blind  suppliant  in  the  way, 

By  friendly  hands  to  Jesus  led, 
Prayed  to  behold  the  light  of  day, 

"  Receive  thy  sight,"  the  Saviour  said. 

At  once  he  saw  the  pleasant  rays 

That  lit  the  glorious  firmament; 
And,  with  firm  step  and  words  of  praise, 

He  followed  where  the  Master  went. 

Look  down  in  pity,  Lord,  we  pray, 
On  eyes  oppressed  with  moral  night, 

And  touch  the  darkened  lids  and  say 
The  gracious  words,  "  Receive  thy  sight." 

Then,  in  clear  daylight,  shall  we  see 
Where  walked  the  sinless  Son  of  God; 

And,  aided  by  new  strength  from  Thee, 
Press  onward  in  the  path  He  trod. 

There  is  a  hymn  to  celebrate  Christ's  nativity : 

As  shadows  cast  by  cloud  and  sun 

Flit  o'er  the  summer  grass, 
So,  in  thy  sight,  Almighty  One! 

Earth's  generations  pass. 


THE    NATIVITY    AND    MISSIONS  33 

And  while  the  years,  an  endless  host, 

Come  pressing  swiftly  on, 
The  brightest  names  that  earth  can  boast 

Just  glisten,  and  are  gone. 

Yet  doth  the  Star  of  Bethlehem  shed 

A  lustre  pure  and  sweet; 
And  still  it  leads,  as  once  it  led, 

To  the  Messiah's  feet. 

O  Father,  may  that  holy  Star 

Grow  every  year  more  bright, 
And  send  its  glorious  beam  afar 

To  fill  the  world  with  light. 

And  a  prayer  for  the  regions  of  our  own  land  that 
need  the  gospel : 

Look  from  the  sphere  of  endless  day, 

Oh,  God  of  mercy  and  of  might! 
In  pity  look  on  those  who  stray, 

Benighted,  in  this  land  of  light. 

In  peopled  vale,  in  lonely  glen, 

In  crowded  mart,  by  stream  or  sea, 

How  many  of  the  sons  of  men 

Hear  not  the  message  sent  from  thee. 

Send  forth  thy  heralds,  Lord,  to  call 

The  thoughtless  young,  the  hardened  old, 

A  wandering  flock,  and  bring  them  all 
To  the  Good  Shepherd's  peaceful  fold. 

Send  them  thy  mighty  word  to  speak 
Till  faith  shall  dawn,  and  doubt  depart, — 

To  awe  the  bold,  to  stay  the  weak, 
And  bind  and  heal  the  broken  heart. 

Then  all  these  wastes,  a  dreary  scene 
On  which,  with  sorrowing  eyes,  we  gaze, 

Shall  grow  with  living  waters  green, 
And  lift  to  heaven  the  voice  of  praise. 


34  A    PRAYER    FOR   THE   INTEMPERATE 

There  is  a  hymn  of  pity  for  the  intemperate,  and  a 
prayer  for  their  rescue : 

When  doomed  to  death,  the  Apostle  lay 

At  night,  in  Herod's  dungeon-cell, 
A  light  shone  round  him  like  the  day, 

And  from  his  limbs  the  fetters  fell. 

A  messenger  from  God  was  there, 
To  break  his  chain  and  bid  him  rise, 

And  lo!  the  Saint,  as  free  as  air, 

Walked  forth  beneath  the  open  skies. 

Chains  yet  more  strong  and  cruel  bind 

The  victims  of  that  deadly  thirst 
Which  drowns  the  soul,  and  from  the  mind 

Blots  the  bright  image  stamped  at  first. 

Oh,  God  of  Love  and  Mercy,  deign 
To  look  on  those,  with  pitying  eye, 

Who  struggle  with  that  fatal  chain, 
And  send  them  succor  from  on  high! 

Send  down,  in  its  resistless  might, 

Thy  gracious  Spirit,  we  implore, 
And  lead  the  captive  forth  to  light, 

A  rescued  soul,  a  slave  no  more. 

And  even  the  dedication  of  a  church  draws  out  his 
prayerful  sympathy  and  poetic  feeling: 

O  thou  whose  own  vast  temple  stands, 

Built  over  earth  and  sea, 
Accept  the  walls  that  human  hands 

Have  raised  to  worship  thee. 

Lord,  from  thine  inmost  glory  send, 

Within  these  walls  to  bide, 
The  peace  that  dwelleth  without  end 

Serenely  by  thy  side. 


MOST    SIGNIFICANT    RELIGIOUS    POEM  35 

May  erring  minds,  that  worship  here, 

Be  taught  the  better  way; 
And  they  who  mourn,  and  they  who  fear, 

Be  strengthened  as  they  pray. 

May  faith  grow  firm,  and  love  grow  warm, 

And  pure  devotion  rise, 
While,  round  these  hallowed  walls,  the  storm 

Of  earth-born  passion  dies. 

I  have  yet  to  quote  the  most  significant  of  Bryant's 
distinctly  religious  poems.  It  is  entitled  "  He  hath 
put  all  things  under  his  feet,"  and  this  hymn  declares 
the  world-wide  supremacy  of  Christ : 

O  North,  with  all  thy  vales  of  green! 

O  South,  with  all  thy  palms! 
From  peopled  towns  and  fields  between 

Uplift  the  voice  of  psalms; 
Raise,  ancient  East!  the  anthem  high, 
And  let  the  youthful  West  reply. 

Lo!  in  the  clouds  of  heaven  appears 

God's  well-beloved  Son; 
He  brings  a  train  of  brighter  years: 

His  kingdom  is  begun; 
He  conies  a  guilty  world  to  bless 
With  mercy,  truth,  and  righteousness. 

Oh,  Father!  haste  the  promised  hour, 

When,  at  His  feet,  shall  lie 
All  rule,  authority,  and  power 

Beneath  the  ample  sky; 
When  He  shall  reign  from  pole  to  pole, 
The  Lord  of  every  human  soul; 

When  all  shall  heed  the  words  He  said 

Amid  their  daily  cares, 
And,  by  the  loving  life  He  led, 

Shall  seek  to  pattern  theirs; 
And  He,  who  conquered  Death,  shall  win 
The  nobler  conquest  over  Sin. 


36          THE   CROSS   RARELY   IN    BRYANT'S   VERSES 

This  hymn  does  not  declare  Christ's  absolute  deity, 
nor  does  it  indicate  the  poet's  knowledge  of  that 
spiritual  union  with  Christ  which  is  the  source  of  great- 
est joy  to  the  believer.  Joy  has  its  root  in  sacrifice — 
Christ's  sacrifice  for  us  and  our  sacrifice  to  him.  We 
seldom  read  of  the  Cross,  in  Bryant's  poetry.  Yet 
faith  in  the  Cross  is  not  wholly  absent.  In  his  poem, 
"  Waiting  by  the  Gate,"  he  seems  to  make  all  final  joy 
depend  upon  Christ's  death : 

And  some  approach  the  threshold  whose  looks  are  blank  with 

fear, 

And  some  whose  temples  brighten  with  joy  in  drawing  near, 
As  if  they  saw  dear  faces,  and  caught  the  gracious  eye 
Of  Him,  the  Sinless  Teacher,  who  came  for  us  to  die. 

The  infrequency  of  our  poet's  reference  to  Calvary, 
and  to  the  Christian's  union  with  the  crucified  One,  is 
the  reason  why  his  work  is  so  somber,  so  redolent  of 
duty,  so  given  to  external  nature.  If  he  had  pene- 
trated more  deeply  into  "  the  mystery  of  the  gospel," 
which  is  "  Christ  in  us,"  he  would  have  had  more  of 
the  Christian's  "  hope  of  glory."  Yet  Mr.  John  Bige- 
low  writes  of  him :  "  Though  habitually  an  attendant 
upon  the  ministrations  of  the  Unitarian  clergy  when 
they  were  accessible,  no  one  ever  recognized  more 
completely  or  more  devoutly  the  divinity  of  Christ" 
Even  here,  "  divinity "  may  not  mean  the  same  as 
"  deity."  But  let  us  be  thankful  for  what  we  find.  His 
theism  and  his  recognition  of  God's  providence,  his 
faith  in  God's  love  and  revelation,  have  for  their 
corollary  an  unwavering  belief  in  immortality.  This 
appears  conspicuously  in  his  love-songs,  which  were, 
almost  without  exception,  addressed  to  his  wife,  with 


BELIEF    IN    IMMORTALITY  37 

whom  he  spent  forty-five  years  of  married  life.  Before 
their  marriage  he  addressed  her  as  "  fairest  of  the 
rural  maids,"  and  under  the  pseudonym  of  "  Gene- 
vieve  "  he  made  her  the  subject  of  one  of  his  lightest 
and  sweetest  poems: 

Soon  as  the  glazed  and  gleaming  snow 
Reflects  the  day-dawn  cold  and  clear, 

The  hunter  of  the  West  must  go 
In  depth  of  woods  to  seek  the  deer. 

His  rifle  on  his  shoulder  placed, 

His  stores  of  death  arranged  with  skill, 

His  moccasins  and  snow-shoes  laced — 
Why  lingers  he  beside  the  hill? 

Far,  in  the  dim  and  doubtful  light, 
Where  woody  slopes  a  valley  leave, 

He  sees  what  none  but  lover  might, 
The  dwelling  of  his  Genevieve. 

And  oft  he  turns  his  truant  eye, 

And  pauses  oft,  and  lingers  near; 
But  when  he  marks  the  reddening  sky, 

He  bounds  away  to  hunt  the  deer. 

When  in  1858  Mrs.  Bryant  had  recovered  from  a 
long  and  painful  illness,  the  poet  welcomed  his  wife  in 
the  verses  which  he  named  "  The  Life  that  Is,"  and 
of  these  I  quote  the  first  and  the  last : 

Thou,  who  so  long  hast  pressed  the  couch  of  pain, 
Oh  welcome,  welcome  back  to  life's  free  breath — 

To  life's  free  breath  and  day's  sweet  light  again, 
From  the  chill  shadows  of  the  gate  of  death! 

Now  may  we  keep  thee  from  the  balmy  air 
And  radiant  walks  of  heaven  a  little  space, 

Where  He,  who  went  before  thee  to  prepare 
For  His  meek  followers,  shall  assign  thy  place. 


344943 


38  "  A    LIFETIME  " 

But  in  1866  death  finally  took  his  wife  from  him.  It 
was  an  irremediable  loss,  for  his  reserved  nature  had 
found  in  her  his  only  intimate  friend.  His  poem,  "  A 
Lifetime,"  begins  with  a  treatment  of  grief  in  the 
third  person,  but  it  ends  most  pathetically  by  attribut- 
ing all  the  sorrow  to  himself.  It  is  the  last  poem 
he  composed,  and  it  summarizes  his  own  life: 

And  well  I  know  that  a  brightness 

From  his  life  has  passed  away, 
And  a  smile  from  the  green  earth's  beauty, 

And  a  glory  from  the  day. 

But  I  behold,  above  him, 

In  the  far  blue  depths  of  air, 
Dim  battlements  shining  faintly, 

And  a  throng  of  faces  there; 

See  over  crystal  barrier 

The  airy  figures  bend, 
Like  those  who  are  watching  and  waiting 

The  coming  of  a  friend. 

And  one  there  is  among  them, 

With  a  star  upon  her  brow, 
In  her  life  a  lovely  woman, 

A  sinless  seraph  now. 

I  know  the  sweet  calm  features; 

The  peerless  smile  I  know; 
And  I  stretch  my  arms  with  transport 

From  where  I  stand  below. 

And  the  quick  tears  drown  my  eyelids, 

But  the  airy  figures  fade, 
And  the  shining  battlements  darken 

And  blend  with  the  evening  shade. 

I  am  gazing  into  the  twilight 
Where  the  dim-seen  meadows  lie, 

And  the  wind  of  night  is  swaying 
The  trees  with  a  heavy  sigh. 


A   SORROW    NOT    WITHOUT   HOPE  39 

He  did  not  sorrow  as  those  without  hope,  for  he 
believed  in  Him  who  has  brought  life  and  immortality 
to  light  in  his  glorious  gospel.  He  cannot  think  that 
the  separation  caused  by  death  is  lasting.  In  his  poem, 
"  The  Future  Life,"  he  writes : 

How  shall  I  know  thee  in  the  sphere  which  keeps 

The  disembodied  spirits  of  the  dead, 
When  all  of  thee  that  time  could  wither  sleeps 

And  perishes  among  the  dust  we  tread? 

For  I  shall  feel  the  sting  of  ceaseless  pain, 
If  there  I  meet  thy  gentle  presence  not; 

Nor  hear  the  voice  I  love,  nor  read  again 
In  thy  serenest  eyes  the  tender  thought. 

The  love  that  lived  through  all  the  stormy  past, 

And  meekly  with  my  harsher  nature  bore, 
And  deeper  grew,  and  tenderer  to  the  last, 
Shall  it  expire  with  life,  and  be  no  more? 

Shalt  thou  not  teach  me,  in  that  calmer  home, 
The  wisdom  that  I  learned  so  ill  in  this — 

The  wisdom  which  is  love — till  I  become 
Thy  fit  companion  in  that  land  of  bliss? 

Indeed,   he   trusts   that  even   now   the  separation  is 
not  complete : 

May  we  not  think  that  near  us  thou  dost  stand 
With  loving  ministrations?  for  we  know 

Thy  heart  was  never  happy  when  thy  hand 
Was  forced  its  tasks  of  mercy  to  forego. 

May'st  thou  not  prompt  with  every  coming  day 
The  generous  aim  and  act,  and  gently  win 

Our  restless,  wandering  thoughts,  to  turn  away 
From  every  treacherous  path  that  ends  in  sin? 

His  poem,  "  The  Death  of  the  Flowers,"  has  a 
moving  pathos,  from  the  fact  that  it  commemorates  the 


4O  "  THE   DEATH    OF    THE    FLOWERS  " 

loss  of  a  beloved  sister  who  died  in  her  twenty-second 
year: 

The  melancholy  days  are  come,  the  saddest  of  the  year, 
Of  wailing  winds,  and  naked  woods,  and  meadows  brown  and 
sere.  .  . 

Where  are  the   flowers,  the  fair  young  flowers,  that  lately 

sprang  and  stood, 

In  brighter  light  and  softer  airs,  a  beauteous  sisterhood? 
Alas,  they  all  are  in  their  graves!    The  gentle  race  of  flowers 
Are  lying  in  their  lowly  beds,  with  the  fair  and  good  of  ours. 

And  then  I  think  of  one  who  in  her  youthful  beauty  died, 
The  fair,  meek  blossom  that  grew  up  and  faded  by  my  side: 
In  the  cold,  moist  earth  we  laid  her,  when  the  forests  cast 

the  leaf, 

And  we  wept  that  one  so  lovely  should  have  a  life  so  brief: 
Yet  not  unmeet  it  was  that  one,  like  that  young  friend  of 

ours, 
So  gentle  and  so  beautiful,  should  perish  with  the  flowers. 

He  calls  one  of  his  poems  "  The  Past."  He  sees  all 
of  earth's  treasures  sooner  or  later  swallowed  up  by 
time.  But,  personifying  the  past,  he  writes : 

Thine  for  a  space  are  they — 
Yet  shalt  thou  yield  thy  treasures  up  at  last; 

Thy  gates  shall  yet  give  way, 
Thy  bolts  shall  fall,  inexorable  Past! 

All  that  of  good  and  fair 
Has  gone  into  thy  womb  from  earliest  time, 

Shall  then  come  forth  to  wear 
The  glory  and  the  beauty  of  its  prime. 

They  have  not  perished — no! 
Kind  words,  remembered  voices  once  so  sweet, 

Smiles,  radiant  long  ago, 
And  features,  the  great  soul's  apparent  seat. 


FILIAL    PIETY  41 

All  shall  come  back;  each  tie 
Of  pure  affection  shall  be  knit  again; 

Alone  shall  Evil  die, 
And  Sorrow  dwell  a  prisoner  in  thy  reign. 

And  then  shall  I  behold 
Him,  by  whose  kind  paternal  side  I  sprung, 

And  her,  who,  still  and  cold, 
Fills  the  next  grave — the  beautiful  and  young. 

One  of  Bryant's  noblest  traits  was  his  filial  piety, 
the  love  for  parents  and  for  kindred,  which  many 
waters  could  not  quench  nor  the  floods  drown,  and 
which  the  lapse  of  time  and  the  separation  of  death 
only  intensified  and  exalted.  He  cannot  view  the 
glory  of  "  June,"  without  thinking  of  the  friends  who 
will  visit  his  tomb : 

These  to  their  softened  hearts  should  bear 

The  thought  of  what  has  been, 
And  speak  of  one  who  cannot  share 

The  gladness  of  the  scene; 
Whose  part,  in  all  the  pomp  that  fills 
The  circuit  of  the  summer  hills, 

Is  that  his  grave  is  green. 

Rest,  therefore,  thou 

Whose  early  guidance  trained  my  infant  steps — 
Rest,  in  the  bosom  of  God,  till  the  brief  sleep 
Of  death  is  over,  and  a  happier  life 
Shall  dawn  to  waken  thine  insensible  dust.9 

In  "  The  Indian  Girl's  Lament,"  the  bereaved  maiden 
comforts  her  soul  with  the  thought  that  her  lover  will 
yet  be  hers : 

9  "  Hymn  to  Death." 


42  THE    FRINGED   GENTIAN 

And  thou  dost  wait  and  watch  to  meet 
My  spirit  sent  to  join  the  blessed, 

And,  wondering  what  detains  my  feet 
From  that  bright  land  of  rest, 

Dost  seem,  in  every  sound,  to  hear 

The  rustling  of  my  footsteps  near. 

"  The  Fringed  Gentian  "  suggests  to  Bryant  an  old 
man's  departure  from,  this  earthly  life : 

Thou  waitest  late  and  com'st  alone, 
When  woods  are  bare  and  birds  are  flown, 
And  frosts  and  shortening  days  portend 
The  aged  year  is  near  his  end. 

Then  doth  thy  sweet  and  quiet  .eye 
Look  through  its  fringes  to  the  sky, 
Blue— blue— as  if  that  sky  let  fall 
A  flower  from  its  cerulean  wall. 

I  would  that  thus,  when  I  shall  see 
The  hour  of  death  draw  near  to  me, 
Hope,  blossoming  within  my  heart, 
May  look  to  heaven  as  I  depart. 

"  The  Old  Man's  Funeral  "  is  a  poem  in  which  Bryant 
might  seem  to  be  describing  his  own  end : 

Why  weep  ye  then  for  him,  who,  having  won 
The  bound  of  man's  appointed  years,  at  last, 
Life's  blessings  all  enjoyed,  life's  labors  done, 

Serenely  to  his  final  rest  has  passed; 
While  the  soft  memory  of  his  virtues,  yet, 
Lingers  like  twilight  hues,  when  the  bright  sun  is  set. 

His  youth  was  innocent;  his  riper  age 
Marked  with  some  act  of  goodness  every  day; 
And  watched  by  eyes  that  loved  him,  calm  and  sage, 

Faded  his  late  declining  years  away. 
Meekly  he  gave  his  being  up,  and  went 
To  share  the  holy  rest  that  waits  a  life  well  spent. 


IMMORTAL    HOPE  43 

"  The  Journey  of  Life  "  ends  with  a  stanza  of  im- 
mortal hope : 

And  I,  with  faltering  footsteps,  journey  on, 
Watching  the  stars  that  roll  the  hours  away, 

Till  the  faint  light  that  guides  me  now  is  gone, 
And,  like  another  life,  the  glorious  day 

Shall  open  o'er  me  from  the  empyreal  height, 

With  warmth,  and  certainty,  and  boundless  light. 

There  is  a  "  Paradise  of  Tears  " : 

There  every  heart  rejoins  its  kindred  heart; 
There,  in  a  long  embrace  that  none  may  part, 
Fulfilment  meets  desire,  and  that  fair  shore 
Beholds  its  dwellers  happy  evermore. 

"  And  I,"  he  said,  "  shall  sleep  ere  long; 

These  fading  gleams  will  soon  be  gone; 
Shall  sleep  to  rise  refreshed  and  strong 

In  the  bright  day  that  yet  will  dawn."10 

"  The  Flood  of  Years  "  will  bring  at  length  the  con- 
summation of  all  our  hopes : 

Old  sorrows  are  forgotten  now, 
Or  but  remembered  to  make  sweet  the  hour 
That  overpays  them;  wounded  hearts  that  bled 
Or  broke  are  healed  forever.    In  the  room 
Of  this  grief-shadowed  present,  there  shall  be 
A  Present  in  whose  reign  no  grief  shall  gnaw 
The  heart,  and  never  shall  a  tender  tie 
Be  broken;  in  whose  reign  the  eternal  Change, 
That  waits  on  growth  and  action,  shall  proceed 
With  everlasting  Concord  hand  in  hand. 

It  must  be  acknowledged  that  this  earliest  of  our 
American  poets  had  his  limitations.     He  had  not  the 

10  "  The  Two  Travellers." 


44  BRYANT  S    LIMITATIONS 

breadth  of  the  great  masters  of  his  art.  Science  and 
philosophy  did  not  interest  him,  as  they  interested 
Tennyson.  The  complexity  of  human  nature  is  not 
depicted  in  his  verse,  as  we  find  it  depicted  by  Brown- 
ing. A  certain  narrowness  of  range  characterizes  all 
his  work.  He  is  descriptive  and  meditative,  but  never 
lyric  or  dramatic.  There  is  an  ever-recurring  re- 
membrance of  death  and  the  grave.  Critics  have  de- 
bated the  question  how  a  youth  of  seventeen  could  have 
chosen  "  Thanatopsis  "  for  a  subject.  It  is  even  more 
remarkable  that  the  poetical  writing  of  after  years 
still  dealt  with  this  as  its  central  theme.  Dr.  William 
C.  Gannett,  with  his  minute  knowledge  of  literary  his- 
tory, has  suggested  an  explanation  both  plausible  and 
interesting.  The  first  five  years  of  Bryant's  life  were 
spent  in  a  log  house  whose  windows  looked  across  the 
road  upon  the  stone-walled  village  burying-ground. 
The  child's  earliest  impressions  of  the  world  were  con- 
nected with  man's  mortality.  Puritan  training  traced 
this  mortality  to  an  original  apostasy  of  the  race  from 
God,  and  to  the  penalty  of  a  broken  law.  The  thoughts 
of  youth  are  long,  long  thoughts,  and  Bryant  never 
outgrew  the  somberness  of  this  early  view  of  the  uni- 
verse. 

Jean  Paul  has  said  that  the  melancholy  of  youth  is 
the  veil  which  a  kind  Providence  throws  over  the 
faces  of  those  who  are  to  climb  the  dazzling  Alpine 
heights  of  success  and  fame.  But  it  surely  belongs  to 
manhood  to  look  with  unveiled  face  upon  the  realities 
of  existence.  The  meagerness  of  Bryant's  schooling 
prevented  his  emancipation.  If  he  had  gone  to  Yale, 
as  he  had  hoped  to  do,  association  with  his  equals  and 


SOMBERNESS    OF    BRYANT'S   VERSE  45 

his  superiors  would  have  drawn  him  out  of  himself,  and 
would  have  made  him  more  a  man  of  the  world.  He 
was  naturally  shy  and  seclusive.  As  an  editor,  he  dis- 
liked to  meet  socially  those  whom  he  might  be  called 
upon  to  criticize.  His  impartiality  was  sometimes  like 
that  of  the  reviewer  whose  freedom  from  prejudice 
is  due  to  the  fact  that  he  has  not  read  the  book  he 
criticizes.  Greater  variety  of  association  would  have 
added  to  the  number  of  the  themes  which  kindled  in 
him  the  poetic  fire. 

But  I  must  add  to  all  this  my  belief  that  Bryant's 
mournfulness  was  the  result  of  an  imperfect  under- 
standing of  the  Christian  revelation.  He  was  a  Puri- 
tan poet,  and  Puritanism  too  often  lacked  the  recogni- 
tion of  a  present  Christ.  In  "  The  Pilgrim's  Progress," 
Christian  expects  to  see  his  Saviour  when  he  reaches 
the  heavenly  city,  but  he  is  destitute  of  his  companion- 
ship on  the  journey  thither.  Though  strong  faith 
in  a  future  life  made  Bryant  serene,  his  serenity  was 
too  much  like  resignation — he  needed  more  of  joy  in 
the  present.  Such  joy  would  have  enlarged  the  area 
of  his  poetic  achievement,  while  at  the  same  time  it 
tempered  the  critical  spirit  of  the  editor. 

But  one  thing  must  always  be  said  of  our  poet:  he 
was  sincere  and  pure.  There  is  no  mawkish  senti- 
mentality in  his  verse,  no  pandering  to  the  lower  in- 
stincts of  humanity,  no  expression  of  merely  transient 
and  conventional  religious  feeling.  Lord  Byron  could 
write  hymns  in  histrionic  fashion,  as  a  brilliant  imper- 
sonator; of  such  hypocrisy  Bryant  was  incapable.  His 
limitations,  therefore,  are  as  instructive  as  his  gifts. 
Like  Wordsworth,  he  is  a  poet  of  nature.  But,  while 


46        "  LIBRARY  OF  POETRY  AND  SONG  " 

Wordsworth  sees  in  nature  the  immanence  of  God, 
Bryant  sees  in  nature  God's  transcendence  rather,  and 
so  is  the  greater  Puritan  of  the  two.  His  reverence 
for  God's  work  in  nature  is  greater  than  his  reverence 
for  God's  work  in  man.  But  he  has  certainly  taught 
us  that  poetry  is  no  mere  vers  de  societe,  but  rather 
an  embodiment  of  the  deepest  thoughts  of  the  human 
soul: 

He  let  no  empty  gust 
Of  passion  find  an  utterance  in  his  lay, 

A  blast  that  whirls  the  dust 
Along  the  crowded  street  and  dies  away; 
But  feelings  of  calm  power  and  mighty  sweep, 
Like  currents  journeying  through  the  windless 
deep.u 

In  "The  Library  of  Poetry  and  Song,"  the  great 
octavo  volume  which  he  edited,  and  which  contains 
fifteen  hundred  selections  from  four  hundred  authors, 
Bryant  prefaced  the  collection  with  an  Introduction  of 
his  own.  No  better  summary  of  the  history  of  English 
poetry  has  ever  been  written,  and  no  more  judicious 
choice  of  poems  has  ever  been  made.  In  his  Introduc- 
tion, the  poet  gives  us  in  sober  prose  his  theory  of 
verse.  He  tells  us  that  "  only  poems  of  moderate 
length,  or  else  portions  of  the  greater  works,  .  .  pro- 
duce the  effect  upon  the  mind  and  heart  which  make 
the  charm  of  this  kind  of  writing."  He  measured 
his  own  productions  by  this  rule.  Most  of  his  poems 
are  short,  and  the  shortest  are  in  general  the  best.  Yet 
in  his  seventy-second  year  he  undertook  the  Herculean 
task  of  putting  Homer's  Iliad  into  English  verse, 

11 "  The  Poet,"  paraphrased  by  John  Bigelow. 


TRANSLATOR   OF    HOMER  47 

and  the  success  of  this  venture  encouraged  him  to  con- 
tinue his  work  until  he  had  accomplished  the  transla- 
tion of  the  Odyssey.  He  gave  five  years  to  this 
task,  and  finished  it  in  his  seventy-seventh  year.  We 
cannot  understand  it,  unless  we  remember  that  it  was 
his  means  of  occupation  and  diversion  after  the  death 
of  his  wife.  It  was  not  the  toil  and  strain  of  original 
composition.  Homer  furnished  the  thought;  Bryant 
had  only  to  give  the  thought  new  expression.  Homer 
led  him  out  again  into  the  open  air.  There  was  a  like- 
ness between  Bryant's  view  of  nature  and  that  of  the 
first  great  classic  poet.  The  stateliness  and  resonance 
of  Homer's  verse  appealed  to  him.  Embodying  that 
verse  in  English  seemed  to  him  a  service  to  literature. 
And  critics  have  agreed  that  no  English  version  of  the 
Iliad  or  of  the  Odyssey,  in  metrical  form,  surpasses  it 
in  value.  To  my  mind,  this  five  years'  work  of  the 
old  man  eloquent,  accomplished  in  the  darkness  of 
bereavement,  and  with  the  single  light  of  an  undying 
hope,  shows  a  strength  of  will  which  even  death  was 
powerless  to  subdue. 

One  of  our  best  American  critics,  Professor  William 
C.  Wilkinson,  has  compared  Bryant's  lack  of  tropical 
fervor  to  the  statuesque  repose  of  Greek  art,  and  to 
the  calm  dignity  of  George  Washington.  There  is 
emotion  in  his  verse,  but  it  is  emotion  that  warms, 
while  it  does  not  burn.  Passion  is  controlled,  rather 
than  deficient.  The  expression  is  less,  not  greater, 
than  the  feeling.  There  is  no  violence  of  diction.  We 
have  had  but  one  Washington,  and 'but  one  Bryant. 
It  is  well  that  our  line  of  poets  begins  with  one  so  high, 
severe,  and  pure.  This  judgment  of  Professor  Wil- 


48  SUMMARY   OF    BRYANT'S    CHARACTER 

kinson  I  would  adopt  for  my  own,  and  would  add  the 
verses  in  which  he  has  described  the  poet : 

Gentle  in  spirit  as  in  mien  severe; 

Calm  but  not  cold;  strength,  majesty,  and  grace, 
Measure,  and  balance,  and  repose,  in  clear 

Lines,  like  a  sculptor's,  graven  on  the  face 

Such  image  lovers  of  his  verse  have  learned 
To  limn  their  poet,  peaceful  after  strife; 

A  statue,  as  of  life  to  marble  turned? 

Nay,  as  of  marble  turned  to  breathing  life. 

I  have  taken  interest  in  the  story  of  Bryant's  life  and 
work,  in  large  part  because  the  religious  and  theological 
aspects  of  it  have  seemed  to  me  to  have  been  hitherto 
neglected.  Our  earliest  American  poet  furnished  no 
object-lesson  of  unbelief  to  his  successors.  He  did  not 
compass  the  whole  range  of  Christian  truth,  any  more 
than  he  compassed  the  whole  range  of  poetic  inspi- 
ration; but  he  taught  his  countrymen,  and  he  taught 
the  world,  of  God  in  nature  and  in  history,  of  Christ  as 
the  Guide  and  Saviour  of  mankind,  and  of  an  immortal 
life  that  opens  for  us  all  beyond  this  present  transi- 
tory scene.  His  teaching  is  all  the  more  impressive 
and  convincing  because  he  does  not  speak  to  us  as  a 
preacher,  but  as  a  man ;  and  because  he  utters  only  what 
he  has  seen  and  felt.  He  shows  himself  to  be  the  true 
poet,  by  telling  us  the  inner  meaning  of  the  universe, 
and  by  bringing  us 

Authentic  tidings  of  invisible  things. 


II 

RALPH  WALDO  EMERSON 


RALPH  WALDO  EMERSON 


NINE  years  after  Bryant,  Emerson  was  born.  Our 
second  American  poet  began  his  life  in  1803,  half-way 
between  the  war  of  the  Revolution  and  the  war  with 
England  in  1812.  The  embattled  farmers  had  won 
their  independence,  and  they  were  ready  for  another 
fray.  It  was  a  time  of  sturdy  self-assertion.  The 
early  Calvinism  had  been  toned  down  by  a  discovery 
of  the  dignity  of  man.  Emerson  was  the  heir  of  eight 
successive  generations  of  Puritan  divines  who  had  been 
gradually  sloughing  off  their  Puritanism  and  standing 
for  what  they  regarded  as  natural  freedom  of  thought. 
Straitened  circumstances  had  trained  him,  as  they 
trained  Bryant,  to  plain  living;  his  Cambridge  sur- 
roundings were  more  favorable  than  were  Bryant's 
to  high  thinking.  His  father  was  pastor  of  the 
First  Unitarian  Church  of  Boston,  a  pleasing  preacher 
of  somewhat  latitudinarian  doctrine  and  no  stickler 
for  the  mere  forms  of  religion.  When  this  father  died, 
he  left  a  family  of  six  children,  all  of  them  under  ten 
years  of  age,  of  whom  Ralph  was  the  fourth  son.  The 
mother,  with  five  hundred  dollars  a  year  from  the 
church,  kept  boarders  in  order  to  support  and  educate 
her  children.  They  sometimes  lacked  food,  but  then 

51 


52      INTELLECTUAL  DECLARATION  OF  INDEPENDENCE 

their  aunt,  Mary  Moody  Emerson,  a  genius  but  a 
strict  Calvinist,  stayed  their  stomachs  by  telling  them 
stories  of  heroic  Endurance. 

Ralph  Waldo  lived  in  an  atmosphere  of  letters.  He 
is  described  as  a  spiritual-looking  boy  in  blue  nankeen, 
angelic  and  remarkable.  He  had  a  lofty  carriage  of 
the  head,  which  some  attributed  to  pride,  but  which 
was  wholly  unconscious.  There  was  no  education  of 
the  playground  or  the  nursery.  Aunt  Mary  frowned 
upon  mirth  or  frivolity  in  the  children.  The  boy  lived 
a  life  apart,  and  never  learned  to  mingle  freely  with 
his  fellows.  School  began  when  he  was  only  three 
years  old.  He  does  not  appear  to  have  been  a  pre- 
cocious scholar.  In  his  college  course  at  Harvard,  he 
was  not  distinguished  in  his  class,  except  for  a  certain 
poetical  gift.  He  supported  himself  through  college 
by  serving  as  errand  boy  to  the  president,  and  by 
waiting  on  the  table  at  commons.  But  all  this  nour- 
ished in  him  a  habitual  self-reliance,  and  the  child 
was  father  of  the  man,  for  in  his  diary  he  wrote  even 
then,  "  I  purpose  from  this  day  to  utter  no  essay  or 
poem  that  is  not  absolutely  and  peculiarly  my  own." 

Emerson's  address  on  "  The  American  Scholar," 
delivered  at  Cambridge  in  1837,  has  been  called  "  the 
intellectual  Declaration  of  Independence  of  the  United 
States."  But  that  address  was  antedated  by  Bryant's 
dictum,  eighteen  years  before,  that  American  poets 
should  seek  to  achieve  original  expression  and  should 
no  longer  imitate.  It  is  easy  to  see  that  freedom  was 
in  the  air,  and  that  neither  one  of  these  writers  had  a 
monopoly  of  originality.  Colonial  subjection,  even  in 
literature,  had  had  its  day,  and  a  new  age  was-  opening. 


"  THE   SPHINX  "  53 

Both  Bryant  and  Emerson  felt  the  stirrings  of  a  new 
life,  the  former  in  his  vision  of  the  New  England 
landscape,  the  latter  in  his  apprehension  of  the  spirit 
which  moved  within  it.  Of  the  two,  however,  we  must 
give  the  palm  for  simplicity  and  intelligibility  to  Bry- 
ant, though  we  acknowledge  the  superiority  of  Emer- 
son in  breadth  and  insight.  I  speak  of  their  poetry, 
and  I  would  liken  Bryant's  to  the  clear  radiance  of  a 
summer  morning,  while  Emerson's  is  like  the  fitful 
flashes  which  light  up  a  summer  evening  cloud. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  Emerson  puts  his  poem 
of  "  The  Sphinx  "  in  the  forefront  of  his  published 
verses.  This  somewhat  obscure  and  unmetrical  pro- 
duction has  significance  as  indicating  his  own  estimate 
of  his  genius,  and  as  boldly  challenging  the  animad- 
versions of  his  critics.  Emerson  is  himself  a  sphinx. 
His  writings  propound  a  riddle,  which  is  still  un- 
solved. Is  he  philosopher,  or  poet,  or  prophet  ?  Mat- 
thew Arnold  denies  that  he  is  any  one  of  these,  and 
declares  rather  ambiguously  that  he  is  simply  "  the 
friend  and  aider  of  those  who  would  live  in  the  spirit." 
Emerson  is  doubtful  about  himself,  for  at  one  time  he 
says,  "  It  has  been  decided  that  I  cannot  write  poetry  " ; 
at  other  times  he  writes :  "  I  am  half  a  bard,  not  a 
poet,  but  a  lover  of  poetry  and  poets."  "  I  am  born  a 
poet — of  a  lower  class,  no  doubt,  yet  a  poet."  "  I  am 
not  a  great  poet,  but  whatever  is  of  me  is  a  poet." 
"  My  singing,  be  sure,  is  very  husky,  and  is  for  the 
most  part  in  prose.  Still  I  am  a  poet,  in  the  sense  of  a 
preserver  and  dear  lover  of  the  harmonies  that  are 
in  the  soul  and  in  matter,  and  specially  of  the  cor- 
respondences between  these  and  those."  But  James 


54  A    POETICAL   PHILOSOPHER 

Russell  Lowell  said  of  Emerson's  verses,  "  They  are 
pure  pr ;  no,  they  are  not  even  prose." 

Perhaps  it  is  nearest  the  truth  to  say  that  he  was  a 
poetical  philosopher.  But  even  here  we  must  qualify 
our  statement.  If  organization  of  material  is  neces- 
sary to  philosophy,  Emerson  was  no  philosopher,  for 
he  had  no  system.  He  speaks  of  his  own  "  formidable 
tendency  to  the  lapidary  style.  I  build  my  house  of 
boulders.  Here  I  sit,  and  read  and  write,  with  very 
little  system,  and  as  far  as  regards  composition  with 
the  most  fragmentary  result,  paragraphs  incompre- 
hensible, each  sentence  an  infinitely  repellent  particle." 
What  philosophy  he  has  is  infinitely  eclectic  also — a 
medley  of  all  philosophies — fate  and  free  will,  good 
and  evil,  God  and  man,  being  inextricably  combined 
and  confounded.  I  am  more  inclined  to  call  him  a 
prophet  than  to  call  him  either  a  poet  or  a  philosopher. 
The  prophet  utters  some  great  and  vital  truth,  but 
he  mixes  with  this  so  much  of  error  that  he  becomes 
too  often  a  false  prophet.  What  he  says  of  Alcott  is 
even  more  true  of  himself :  "  Gold  ore  is  so  combined 
with  other  elements  that  no  chemistry  is  able  to  sepa- 
rate it  without  great  loss." 

Yet  there  is  a  leading  and  dominant  thought  in  all 
his  work,  and  we  must  grasp  this,  if  we  would  under- 
stand either  his  poetry  or  his  prose.  It  is  the  thought 
of  the  spiritual  meaning  of  the  world.  Emerson,  be- 
yond all  others,  is  the  poet  of  transcendentalism,  but  of 
transcendentalism  under  bonds  to  a  naturalistic  phi- 
losophy. To  explain  and  to  justify  this  estimate  will 
require  some  reflection,  and  I  can  at  present  only  indi- 
cate the  drift  of  my  discussion.  Since  his  verse  is 


MAN    EXPLAINED    BY    NATURE  55 

exceedingly  condensed  and  enigmatical,  we  can  best 
understand  it  if  we  first  study  the  larger  and  plainer 
expression  of  his  thought  in  his  essays.  Let  it  suffice 
now  to  point  out  the  fact  that,  as  Emerson  prefaced 
with  "  The  Sphinx  "  the  collection  of  his  poems,  so  he 
made  his  address  on  "  Nature  "  introduce  the  edition 
of  his  prose.  Where  one  begins  in  philosophy,  there 
he  is  likely  to  end.  If  we  begin  with  the  seemingly 
fixed  successions  of  the  outward  world,  we  shall  be 
apt  to  apply  the  category  of  necessity  to  man,  and 
shall  deny  his  freedom,  responsibility,  sin,  and  guilt; 
whereas,  if  we  begin  with  man's  conscience  and  free 
will,  we  have  the  only  possible  key  to  the  mysteries  of 
nature,  for  nature's  laws  are  only  the  regularities  of 
freedom.  Emerson  makes  the  fundamental  mistake 
of  interpreting  man  by  nature,  instead  of  interpreting 
nature  by  man.  English  Unitarians  were  materalists, 
and  they  thought  of  nature  as  consisting  of  dead  lumps 
and  as  subject  to  unvarying  law.  Emerson  did  not 
wholly  escape  from  their  influence.  "  If  you  wish  to 
understand  intellectual  philosophy,"  he  says,  "  do  not 
turn  inward  by  introversion,  but  study  natural  science. 
Every  time  you  discover  a  law  of  things,  you  discover 
a  principle  of  mind."  He  adds,  indeed,  that  if  you 
wish  to  know  nature,  you  must  study  mind.  But,  for 
all  that,  he  begins  with  nature,  and  finds  there  his 
key  to  unlock  the  secrets  of  the  soul. 

Cabot,  in  his  admirable  biography  of  Emerson,  seeks 
to  mitigate  any  unfavorable  judgment  which  this  fact 
may  lead  us  to  form,  by  explaining  what  our  author 
means  by  nature.  In  itself,  he  would  say,  nature  is 
blind  and  opaque,  is  equivalent  to  fate,  is  the  bondage 


56  DEFECT  IN  EMERSON'S  THINKING 

of  the  spirit.  Man,  as  a  part  of  nature,  is  the  victim 
of  environment.  But  he  is  not  simply  a  part  of  nature ; 
he  is  not  mere  effect;  he  potentially  shares  the  cause. 
On  one  side  of  his  being"  he  is  open  to  the  divine  Mind. 
He  may  detach  himself  from  nature,  he  may  be  a 
finite  creator.  To  thought  and  inspired  will,  nature  is 
transparent  and  plastic.  When  we  yield  to  the  remedial 
force  of  spirit,  evil  is  no  more  seen.  The  prerogative 
of  man  is  to  feel  this  infinity  within  him,  and  to  make 
himself  its  willing  instrument.  Evil  without  only 
reflects  his  unbelief.  There  is  freedom  to  resist  the 
evil  and  to  appropriate  the  powers  of  good.  This  is 
Cabot's  ingenious  interpretation  of  Emerson's  doctrine. 
Emerson  himself,  in  our  opinion,  would  have  smiled 
at  it,  as  philosophically  defining  what  he  meant  to  leave 
undefined.  He  was  no  Ixion,  to  turn  his  cloud  into  a 
Juno.  His  conception  of  nature  was  not  that  of  some- 
thing external  and  capable  of  management  by  will. 
Nature,  he  would  say,  is  itself  will;  but  will  without 
freedom,  a  necessitated  and  deterministic  will ;  and  the 
only  essential  difference  between  Emerson  and  Scho- 
penhauer was  that,  in  Emerson's  view,  this  will  makes 
for  good,  to  Schopenhauer,  for  evil. 

While  thus  indicating  the  fatal  defect  in  Emer- 
son's thinking,  we  may,  with  all  the  more  frankness, 
credit  him  with  whatever  is  good  in  transcendentalism. 
That  much  abused  and  little  understood  word  denoted 
a  method  of  thought  compounded  of  English  idealism, 
German  intuitionalism,  and  Oriental  immanence.  In 
England,  Locke  had  declared  that  intellect  has  no 
ideas  which  are  not  ultimately  derived  from  the  senses. 
Leibnitz,  however,  had  replied  that  intellect  itself  can- 


EMERSON  S    TRANSCENDENTALISM  57 

not  be  so  derived ;  and  Berkeley  had  insisted  that  ma- 
terial things  cannot  be  proved  to  exist  apart  from  mind. 
It  was  easy  for  Hume  to  infer  that  we  know  mental 
substance  within,  as  little  as  we  know  material  sub- 
stance without.  Emerson  did  not  conclude,  with 
Hume,  that  we  need  no  cause  for  our  ideas,  in  the 
world,  in  the  soul,  or  in  God.  He  rather  held  with 
Berkeley,  that,  while  things  do  not  exist  independently 
of  consciousness,  they  do  exist  independently  of  our 
consciousness,  namely,  in  the  mind  of  God,  who  in  a 
correct  philosophy  takes  the  place  of  a  mindless  ex- 
ternal world  as  the  cause  of  our  ideas. 

Emerson's  transcendentalism  regarded  the  universe 
as  spiritual  rather  than  material,  and  in  this  he  rendered 
a  great  service  to  contemporary  thought.  English 
theology  had  hardened  into  Deism — God  was  far 
away,  an  absentee  God,  sitting  on  the  outside  of  the 
universe  ever  since  he  made  it.  New  England  had 
felt  the  influence.  The  old  Calvinism  was  superseded 
by  Arminianism,  and  American  independence  recog- 
nized the  kingdom  of  man  rather  than  the  kingdom  of 
God.  It  was  well  that  Emerson  struck  the  note  of 
idealism.  It  summoned  his  generation  to  a  new  recog- 
nition of  the  spiritual  nature  of  the  world.  If  his  pro- 
test against  materialism  had  only  been  accompanied  by 
a  deeper  ethical  study  of  man,  he  might  have  led  his 
followers  into  theism  rather  than  into  pantheism.  Nor- 
ton calls  Emerson's  essay  on  Nature  "  an  outburst  of 
Romanticism  on  Puritan  ground,"  and  Romanticism 
was  pantheistic  rather  than  theistic. 

German  intuitionalism  was  the  second  factor  in 
Emerson's  transcendentalism.  Kant,  in  his  investiga- 


58  PERVERSION   OF   INTUITIONALISM 

tion  of  our  processes  of  knowing,  had  shown  the  ele- 
ment of  truth  in  the  discarded  doctrine  of  innate  ideas, 
and  had  declared  that  the  mind  employs,  in  all  its  exer- 
cises, assumptions  of  time  and  space,  substance  and 
cause,  design  and  right,  assumptions  which  never  can 
be  proved,  because  they  are  the  basis  of  all  proof.  The 
categories  are  intuitional.  We  have  an  original  and 
unverifiable  knowledge  of  principles  which  lie  at  the 
basis  of  all  thinking;  and,  though  these  principles  are 
undemonstrable,  our  mental  and  moral  nature  is  so 
constructed  that  we  cannot  avoid  acting  upon  them. 
Here,  and  not  in  mere  argument,  lies  our  reason  for 
belief  in  God.  Emerson  seized  upon  the  element  of 
truth  in  intuitionalism,  but  he  sadly  exaggerated  and 
perverted  it.  Instead  of  accepting  it  as  the  regulative 
principle  of  all  knowledge,  he  transformed  it  into  a 
positive  source  of  knowledge.  Instead  of  learning 
from  it  how  we  are  to  learn,  he  learned  from  it  what 
we  are  to  learn.  The  inner  light  took  the  place  of  all 
the  outer  lights  which  God  has  given  us.  Man  became 
a  law  to  himself;  ceased  to  recognize  authority  of  any 
sort ;  had  no  need  of  revelation  from  without.  "  We 
must  not  seek  advantages  from  another,"  says  Emer- 
son ;  "  the  fountain  of  all  good  is  in  ourselves.^.__j 
Each  admirable  genius  is  but  a  successful  diver  in  that 
sea  whose  floor  of  pearls  is  all  your  own.  .  .  Be  lord 
of  a  day,  through  wisdom  and  justice,  and  you  can 
put  up  your  history-books."  It  is  as  if,  in  virtue  of  our 
eyesight,  we  should  deny  that  we  need  external  light 
whereby  to  see,  or  require  any  special  objects  to  be  lit 
up  by  that  light,  or  are  dependent  upon  the  sun  from 
which  that  light  shines  upon  us. 


AUTHORITY    OF    HISTORIC    REVELATIONS  59 

This  is  the  proper  place  to  state  our  chief  objection 
to  Emerson's  intuitionalism,  and  to  point  out  the  need 
of  that  external  authority  which  he  rejected.  God 
does  not  leave  the  child  or  the  race  to  build  up  all 
its  knowledge  anew.  As  acquired  truth  finds  legiti- 
mate forms  of  expression,  it  becomes  authority  for 
others  than  those  who  originally  perceived  it.  All 
advance  in  human  intelligence  depends  upon  our  rev- 
erent reception  of  the  treasure  which  comes  to  us 
from  the  past.  God  requires  us  to  trust  his  historic 
revelations,  and  to  pay  respect  to  the  teaching  of  par- 
ents, discoverers,  and  experts,  in  education,  business, 
science,  and  art.  Religious  truth  is  particularly  subject 
to  this  law.  We  are  not  the  first  who  have  come  in 
contact  with  God,  since  all  men  live,  move,  and  have 
their  being  in  him.  God's  revelations  to  the  individual 
always  build  upon  his  teachings  of  the  race.  To  despise 
authority,  and  to  set  ourselves  up  as  primary  recipients 
of  revelation,  is  to  pour  contempt  upon  the  whole  proc- 
ess of  evolution  and  the  organic  connection  of  the 
generations ;  is,  in  short,  to  substitute  individualism  for 
racial  unity.  Individual  experiences  of  God  and  of 
his  grace  have  been  recorded  in  Scripture,  and  the 
Scriptures  accordingly  are  able  to  make  us  wise  unto 
salvation.  They  specially  and  predominantly  testify 
to  Christ  as  a  divine  and  atoning  Saviour,  and  show 
how  his  teaching  and  work  have  made  God  accessible 
to  men.  God  bids  us  bow  to  Christ,  as  his  representa- 
tive, and  as  our  supreme  authority;  and  the  witness 
of  God  is  this,  that  God  gave  to  us  eternal  life,  and 
that  this  life  is  in  his  Son. 

God  is  light.    But  light  diffused  cannot  be  seen ;  we 


6O  INTUITIONS    NEED    A    CORRECTIVE 

see  by  it,  but  we  do  not  see  it;  it  will  not  be  recognized, 
unless  it  is  concentrated ;  hence  the  sun,  the  physical 
luminary.  So  no  man  has  seen  God  at  any  time — 
"  whom  no  man  has  seen  or  can  see  " ;  the  invisible 
God  needs  to  be  manifested;  hence  the  Son,  the  spir- 
itual luminary.  Finite  beings  will  always  need  more 
than  "  the  light  that  lighteth  every  man,"  need  more 
than  the  diffused  light  of  nature  and  conscience  and 
intuition.  Even  in  heaven  that  diffused  light  is  not 
enough,  for  "  though  they  need  no  candle  nor  light  of 
the  sun  "  because  "  the  Lord  God  gives  them  light,"  it 
is  expressly  declared  that  "  the  lamp  thereof  is  the 
Lamb  " — in  Christ  alone  is  God's  light  concentrated 
and  made  visible  to  his  creatures. 

Emerson's  intuitions  are  not  a  trustworthy  expres- 
sion of  the  infinite  Reason.  They  are  colored  by  finite- 
ness  and  sin.  They  lack  the  sense  of  the  ideal.  They 
unduly  magnify  the  physical.  In  Brahminism,  such 
intuitions  glorify  the  lustful  and  the  base.  They  turn 
might  into  right,  and  the  self  into  God.  Intuition  needs 
the  corrective  of  special  revelation,  and  that  revelation 
is  given  to  us  in  Christ.  Authority  is,  therefore,  neither 
purely  objective  on  the  one  hand,  nor  purely  subjective 
on  the  other,  for  man  is  neither  permanently  infantile, 
nor  fully  mature;  he  is  not  wholly  dependent  upon 
human  teachers,  nor  does  he  discover  all  truth  himself. 
Christianity  is,  first,  objective  manifestation  of  truth, 
in  the  Sun  and  the  Son;  then,  secondly,  subjective  ap- 
propriation of  truth,  by  the  cooperation  of  spirit  with 
Spirit;  that  is,  of  the  human  spirit  with  the  divine 
Spirit. 

What  is  the  place  of  the  Bible  in  this  revelation  ?    I 


PLACE    OF    THE    BIBLE    IN    REVELATION  6 1 

reply  that  the  Bible  is  a  telescope  between  man  and 
God;  it  is  the  rending  of  a  veil.  We  do  not  worship 
the  telescope,  on  the  one  hand,  nor,  on  the  other  hand, 
do  we  refuse  to  use  it.  It  is  an  authority  in  astron- 
omy. Similarly,  the  written  records  of  Christianity 
are  our  authority  in  religion.  Give  them  up,  trust 
your  intuitions,  and  you  may  have  Christian  Science, 
or  pantheism,  or  Romanist  worship  of  Virgin  and 
saints,  and  a  hierarchy  that  destroys  human  freedom. 
Give  up  historic  Christianity,  and  you  put  an  end  to 
Christian  life  and  experience.  Faith  in  the  authority  of 
Scripture  is  perfectly  consistent  with  free  inquiry  as 
to  the  method  of  its  evolution  and  inspiration.  No 
criticism,  higher  or  lower,  can  destroy  its  life.  The 
total  teaching  of  the  Bible  is  ascertainable  on  all  points 
that  are  essential  to  salvation;  for  salvation  is  de- 
pendent not  on  the  book,  but  on  the  person  of  Jesus 
Christ,  who  is  revealed  in  the  book.  Union  with  Christ 
is  the  one  essential,  and  belief  in  Scripture  and  the 
church  is  incidental.  The  Bible  record  of  historic  facts 
and  of  past  experience  is  authority  for  us,  because  it 
makes  known  Christ  and  brings  us  in  contact  with  him. 
The  Bible  does  not  take  the  place  of  Christ;  its  au- 
thority is  not  original ;  it  simply  reveals  Christ,  who  is 
the  authority. 

All  this  throws  light  upon  one  of  the  great  heresies 
of  modern  theology,  this  namely,  that  the  Bible  is  only 
a  record  of  human  experiences,  and  not  a  revelation 
from  God.  What  is  to  prevent  God  from  revealing 
himself  through  those  very  experiences?  Why  may 
he  not  so  utter  his  messages  that  they  shall  be  actual 
voices  from  on  high?  Grant  that  the  revelation  is  pro- 


62  ORIENTAL    IMMANENCE 

gressive.  Still  may  we  believe  in  the  unity,  sufficiency, 
and  authority  of  Scripture. 

Oriental  immanence  contributed  a  final  element  to 
Emerson's  transcendentalism.  The  doctrine  of  the. 
Over-Soul,  in  which  every  man's  particular  being  is 
contained,  is  indeed  the  central  principle  of  his  think- 
ing. He  regarded  God  as  immanent,  not  only  in  na- 
ture, but  also  in  man ;  one  Mind  is  common  to  all  men ; 
and  each  man  is  a  new  incarnation.  "  I  am  part  and 
parcel  of  God,"  he  said.  "  The  simplest  person,  who 
in  his  integrity  worships  God,  becomes  God."  Both 
nature  and  humanity  were  in  this  way  so  glorified  that 
strange  inferences  were  sometimes  drawn.  He  called 
mandarin  oranges  "  Christianity  in  apples."  A  story 
is  current  that,  at  the  opera,  Emerson  and  Margaret 
Fuller  were  gazing  at  the  ballet,  when  Miss  Fuller  re- 
marked, "  Ralph,  this  is  poetry ! "  and  he  replied, 
"  Margaret,  this  is  religion !  " 

Doctor  Harrison,  of  Kenyon  College,  has  written  a 
valuable  book  on  "  The  Teachers  of  Emerson,"  in 
which  he  aims  to  disclose  the  sources  of  Emerson's  doc- 
trine. He  traces  it  back  ultimately  to  Plato,  though 
he  grants  that  Neoplatonism  had  greater  influence  upon 
Emerson  than  had  Plato  himself.  Plato  certainly 
taught  the  ineffable  unity  of  all  being,  by  reason  of  its 
participation  in  the  divine  ideas.  But  this  was  not  the 
peculiar  doctrine  of  Emerson.  He  taught  the  imma- 
nence of  an  active  God  in  humanity  and  the  mystical 
union  of  humanity  with  Deity.  He  found  this  doctrine 
in  the  Neoplatonic  speculations  of  the  Alexandrian  Plo- 
tinus,  and  the  ecstatic  utterances  of  the  Hindu  Vedas 
fell  in  with  his  thought.  He  was  not  a  profound  stu- 


EMERSON'S  ECLECTICISM  63 

dent  of  the  mystics,  any  more  than  he  was  a  profound 
student  of  the  philosophers.  He  was  no  great  scholar, 
and  it  was  mainly  translations  that  he  read.  But  he 
had  a  way  of  appropriating  whatever  suited  his  pur- 
pose; like  Moliere  he  could  say,  "  Je  prends  mon  bien 
ou  je  le  trouve."  Tauler,  Fox,  Swedenborg,  furnished 
him  with  material,  and  he  did  not  disdain  to  borrow 
from  the  Persian  Saadi  and  Omar  Khayyam.  He 
made  his  own  whatever  in  all  literature  asserted  the 
presence  and  energy  of  God  in  every  particle  of  the 
universe  and  in  every  human  soul. 

If  Spinoza  could  be  called  "  a  God-intoxicated  man," 
Emerson  was  even  better  entitled  to  this  designation; 
for  while  Spinoza's  God  was  only  Nature,  Emerson's 
God  still  retained  some  of  the  attributes  of  personality 
derived  from  Calvinism.  The  survival  of  elements 
belonging  to  Emerson's  ancestral  religion  is  indeed 
all  that  rescues  his  work  from  gross  idolatry  of  nature. 
In  so  many  words,  he  denied  God's  personality :  "  I  say 
that  I  cannot  find,  when  I  explore  my  own  conscious- 
ness, any  truth  in  saying  that  God  is  a  person,  but  the 
reverse.  .  .  To  represent  him  as  an  individual  is  to 
shut  him  out  of  my  consciousness."  But  let  us  be  just 
to  Emerson.  By  personality,  he  may  mean  nothing  but 
limitation  to  an  individual.  He  also  says :  "  I  deny 
personality  to  God,  because  it  is  too  little,  not  too 
much.  Life,  personal  life,  is  faint  and  cold,  to  the 
energy  of  God.  For  Reason  and  Love  and  Beauty,  or 
that  which  is  all  these — it  is  the  life  of  life,  the  reason 
of  reason,  the  love  of  love."  Emerson  should  have 
remembered  that  it  is  finiteness,  and  not  personality, 
that  implies  limitation :  an  infinite  personality  may  be 


64  SELF-DEIFICATION 

unlimited.  And,  as  will  in  man  is  the  highest  and  most 
inclusive  attribute  of  his  personality,  we  cannot  deny 
personality  to  God  without  depriving  him  of  will. 
Such  denial  makes  him  identical  with  nature  and  not 
its  informing  Spirit ;  conterminous  with  nature  and  not 
above  it.  And  since  all  we  know  of  nature  we  know 
from  the  processes  of  our  own  minds,  God  is  identified 
with  those  processes;  we  have  no  knowledge  of  him  as 
existing  apart  from  ourselves;  we  find  God  only  within 
our  own  souls;  he  is  immanent  but  not  transcendent. 
Thus  transcendentalism  contradicts  itself  and  becomes 
self-deification.  It  is  the  precise  opposite  of  the  Scrip- 
ture representation,  which  speaks  of  God  as  not  only 
"  in  all,"  and  "  through  all,"  but  also  "  above  all."  The 
God  whom  the  Bible  recognizes  as  immanent  is  a  God 
of  will,  as  well  as  of  power;  a  God  of  wisdom  and 
love  and  holiness ;  a  God  who  can  come  down  in  special 
ways  to  his  creatures;  and  who  can  reveal  himself  in 
Christ,  as  their  Saviour  from  the  penalty  and  the  power 
of  sin.  The  God  of  Emerson,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a 
mere  abstraction,  a  mere  idealization  of  nature.  He 
tells  us  that 

Conscious  Law  is  King  of  kings.1 

But  he  might  also  have  called  Law  unconscious,  for  he 
denied  to  it  personality;  and  Doctor  Ware  said  well, 
in  criticism  of  Emerson's  doctrine :  "  Law,  truth,  love, 
are  no  Deity.  There  must  be  some  Being,  to  exercise 
these  attributes.  There  is  a  personal  God,  or  there  is 
no  God." 

»  "  Woodnotes,"  II. 


THE   IMMANENCE   OF    CHRIST  65 

We  can  appreciate  the  gravity  of  this  error,  if  we 
contrast  Emerson's  view  of  nature  with  that  of  another 
Puritan,  Jonathan  Edwards.  Edwards  escapes  from 
Emerson's  moral  indifference,  and  from  his  blindness 
to  personality  in  God,  by  recognizing  in  nature  the 
presence  and  working  of  Jesus  Christ,  in  whom  all 
things  were  created  and  in  whom  all  things  consist. 
Edwards  writes : 

"  He  who,  by  his  immediate  influence,  gives  being  every 
moment,  and  by  his  Spirit  actuates  the  world,  because  he 
inclines  to  communicate  himself  and  his  excellencies,  doth 
doubtless  communicate  his  excellency  to  bodies,  as  far  as 
there  is  any  consent  or  analogy.  And  the  beauty  of  face  and 
sweet  airs  in  men  are  not  always  the  effect  of  the  correspond- 
ing excellencies  of  the  mind;  yet  the  beauties  of  nature  are 
really  emanations  or  shadows  of  the  excellencies  of  the  Son 
of  God.  So  that,  when  we  are  delighted  with  flowery 
meadows  and  gentle  breezes  of  wind,  we  may  consider  that 
we  see  only  the  emanations  of  the  sweet  benevolence  of 
Jesus  Christ.  When  we  behold  the  fragrant  rose  and  lily, 
we  see  his  love  and  purity.  So  the  green  trees  and  fields,  and 
singing  of  birds,  are  the  emanations  of  his  infinite  joy  and 
benignity.  The  easiness  and  naturalness  of  trees  and  vines 
are  shadows  of  his  beauty  and  loveliness.  The  crystal  rivers 
and  murmuring  streams  are  the  footsteps  of  his  favor,  grace, 
and  beauty.  When  we  behold  the  light  and  brightness  of 
the  sun,  the  golden  edges  of  an  evening  cloud,  or  the  beau- 
teous bow,  we  behold  the  adumbrations  of  his  glory  and 
goodness,  and,  in  the  blue  sky,  of  his  mildness  and  gentleness. 
There  are  also  many  things  wherein  we  may  behold  his  awful 
majesty:  in  the  sun  in  his  strength,  in  comets,  in  thunder,  in 
the  hovering  thunder-clouds,  in  ragged  rocks  and  the  brows 
of  mountains.  That  beauteous  light  wherewith  the  world 
is  filled  in  a  clear  day  is  a  lively  shadow  of  his  spotless  holi- 
ness, and  happiness  and  delight  in  communicating  himself. 
And  doubtless  this  is  a  reason  why  Christ  is  compared  so 
often  to  these  things,  and  called  by  their  names,  as  the  Sun 
of  Righteousness,  the  Morning  Star,  the  Rose  of  Sharon,  and 


66  THE   TRUE   TRANSCENDENTALISM 

Lily  of  the  Valley,  the  apple  tree  among  the  trees  of  the 
wood,  a  bundle  of  myrrh,  a  roe,  or  a  young  hart.  By  this 
we  discover  the  beauty  of  many  of  those  metaphors  and 
similes  which  to  an  unphilosophical  person  do  seem  so  un- 
couth. In  like  manner,  when  we  behold  the  beauty  of  man's 
body  in  its  perfection,  we  still  see  like  emanations  of  Christ's 
divine  perfections,  although  they  do  not  always  flow  from  the 
mental  excellencies  of  the  person  that  has  them.  But  we 
see  the  most  proper  image  of  the  beauty  of  Christ  when 
we  see  beauty  in  the  human  soul." 

This  is  the  true  transcendentalism,  which  sees  in  all 
nature  Christ's  manifestation  of  a  personal  and  loving 
God.  But  this  is  plainly  not  the  transcendentalism  of 
Emerson. 

Our  author  said  to  Dr.  William  Hague  that  fresh 
readings  of  the  Quaker  writers  had  intensified  his  con- 
viction that  we  must  outgrow  externalism.  George 
Fox  always  remained  one  of  his  heroes;  though,  as 
Doctor  Van  Dyke  remarks,  he  was  himself  "  kept  sane 
by  his  New  England  sense  and  humor."  He  saw  how 
indistinct  was  the  line  that  separated  religious  ecstasy 
from  hysterical  frenzy.  Yet  the  inner  light  seemed  to 
him  the  only  medium  of  divine  communication.  Why 
should  we  not  enjoy  religion  by  revelation  to  us,  he 
thought,  instead  of  getting  it  through  others?  This 
suggests  the  fundamental  defect  in  Emerson's  char- 
acter. Both  Henry  James  and  John  Morley  have 
pointed  out  that  Emerson  had  no  sense  of  sin.  He 
regarded  his  soul  as  the  unresisting  organ  of  the  Over- 
Soul,  and  serene  self-sufficiency  characterized  all  his 
writing  and  all  his  action.  He  needed  no  teacher.  His 
own  fmiteness  and  limitation  never  led  him  to  distrust 
his  own  powers;  his  own  sinfulness  and  guilt  never 


EMERSON    WITHOUT   A   SENSE    OF   SIN  67 

taught  him  dependence  on  a  Redeemer.  His  was  not 
the  humility  of  the  little  child  which  Jesus  himself  ex- 
emplifies, and  which  he  makes  the  condition  of  entrance 
into  his  kingdom.  Rather  do  we  find  in  him  a  Stoic 
confidence  that  all  is  well,  and  an  ignoring  of  the  evil 
aspects  of  life,  both  in  himself  and  in  others.  "  The 
riddle  of  the  painful  earth  " — human  sin  and  shame 
and  death — this  has  escaped  the  notice  of  the  Sphinx, 
and  the  result  is  that  Emerson  lacks  sympathy  for  the 
fallen  and  understanding  of  the  world's  great  need. 
He  had  no  experience  of  the  Inferno  of  guilt  and  retri- 
bution, such  as  a  keen  conscience  gave  to  Dante,  and 
therefore  he  could  know  nothing  of  the  Paradiso  of 
the  forgiven,  nor  of  the  Purgatorio  of  repentance  and 
faith  that  prepares  men  for  blessedness  and  likeness 
to  God.  He  thought  Dante  "  a  man  to  put  in  a 
museum,  but  not  in  his  house." 

Emerson's  overgrown  self-trust  disdained  to  recog- 
nize himself  as  a  sinner.  "  They  that  are  whole  need 
not  a  physician."  He  taught  that  man's  shortcoming 
is  not  sin,  but  only  a  necessary  stage  in  this  progress. 
It  is  the  "  green  apple  theory  "  of  moral  evil.  Sin  is  a 
green  apple,  which  needs  only  time  and  sunshine  and 
growth  to  bring  it  to  ripeness  and  beauty  and  useful- 
ness. But  alas!  our  sin  is  not  a  green  apple  that  can 
be  ripened  by  growth,  but  an  apple  with  a  worm  at  the 
heart,  whose  progress,  if  left  to  itself,  is  toward  rot- 
tenness and  ruin.  Sin  is  apostasy  and  revolt  of  man's 
free  will,  which  only  supernatural  means  can  cure. 
Emerson's  false  premise 'that  we  must  look  to  physics, 
rather  than  to  ethics,  for  our  interpretation  of  God's 
being,  leads  him  to  the  false  conclusion  that  sin  is 


68  "  GREEN    APPLE   THEORY  "    OF    EVIL 

a  necessity  in  the  universe,  and  that  it  always  results 
in  good.  When  man's  free  will  is  left  out  of  the 
account,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  guilt  or  just  con- 
demnation. In  all  evil  man  is  ignorantly  seeking  good  : 

"  The  fiend  that  man  harries 

Is  love  of  the  Best; 
Yawns  the  pit  of  the  Dragon, 

Lit  by  rays  from  the  Blest. 
The  Lethe  of  Nature 

Can't  trance  him  again, 
Whose  soul  sees  the  perfect, 

Which  his  eyes  seek  in  vain. 

"  Pride  ruined  the  angels, 

Their  shame  them  restores; 
Lurks  the  joy  that  is  sweetest 
In  stings  of  remorse." 2 

Out  of  the  good  of  evil  born, 
Came  Uriel's  voice  of  cherub  scorn, 
And  a  blush  tinged  the  upper  sky, 
And  the  gods  shook,  they  knew  not  why.3 

If  these  mysterious  lines  mean  only  that  the  forces 
of  the  universe  are  by  an  omniscient  and  beneficent  will 
made  even  in  spite  of  themselves  to  help  the  cause  of 
truth  and  righteousness,  they  might  be  regarded  as  a 
cryptic  declaration  of  Paul's  doctrine  that  all  things 
work  together  for  good  to  them  that  love  God. 
"  Write  it  on  your  heart,"  says  Emerson,  "  that  every 
day  is  the  best  day  in  the  year."  Yes,  we  reply,  if  this 
means  that  our  best  days  in  the  past  have  not  ex- 
hausted God's  power  and  love.  But  if  it  asserts  an 
automatic  inclination  of  evil  toward  good  and  that  sin 

"  The  Sphinx."  3  "  Uriel." 


SIN    ITS    OWN    REMEDY  69 

is  its  own  remedy,  it  teaches  pernicious  error.  That 
this,  latter  interpretation  may  be  suspected  to  be  the 
correct  one  finds  some  justification  in  Emerson's  poem 
"  The  Park  "  : 

The  prosperous  and  beautiful 

To  me  seem  not  to  wear 
The  yoke  of  conscience  masterful, 

Which  galls  me  everywhere. 

Yet  spake  yon  purple  mountain, 

Yet  said  yon  ancient  wood, 
That  Night  or  Day,  that  Love  or  Crime, 

Leads  all  souls  to  the  Good. 

Give  all  to  love- 
Obey  thy  heart; 
Friends,  kindred,  days, 
Estate,  good  fame, 
Plans,  credit,  and  the  Muse, — 
Nothing  refuse. 

Stealing  grace  from  all  alive; 
Heartily  know, 
When  half-gods  go, 
The  gods  arrive.4 

I  cannot  spare  water  or  wine, 
Tobacco-leaf,  or  poppy,  or  rose; 

From  the  earth-poles  to  the  Line, 
All  between  that  works  or  grows, 

Everything  is  kin  of  mine. 


Too  long  shut  in  strait  and  few, 
Thinly  dieted  on  dew, 
I  will  use  the  world,  and  sift  it, 
To  a  thousand  humors  shift  it, 
As  you  spin  a  cherry. 


«  "  Give  All  to  Love." 


7O  DISCORD    NECESSARY   TO    HARMONY 

O  doleful  ghosts,  and  goblins  merry! 
O  all  you  virtues,  methods,  mights, 
Means,  appliances,  delights, 
Reputed  wrongs  and  braggart  rights, 
Smug  routine,  and  things  allowed, 
Minorities,  things  under  cloud! 
Hither!  take  me,  use  me,  fill  me, 
Vein  and  artery,  though  ye  kill  me!5 

One  thing  is  forever  good; 

That  one  thing  is  Success, — 

Dear  to  the  Eumenides, 

And  to  all  the  heavenly  brood. 

Who  bides  at  home,  nor  looks  abroad, 

Carries  the  eagles,  and  masters  the  sword.6 

These  quotations  show  how  far  Emerson  was  from 
recognizing  evil  as  a  "  body  of  death  "  which  required 
a  Deliverer.  It  is  only  a  discord  necessary  to  perfect 
harmony ;  it  is  only  the  dark  background  without  which 
we  could  not  appreciate  the  bright ;  it  is  indeed  the  soil 
from  which  truth  and  goodness  must  emerge.  "  Our 
crimes,"  he  says,  "  may  be  lively  stones,  out  of  which 
we  shall  construct  the  temple  of  the  true  God."  We 
must  even  see  in  moral  evil  a  manifestation  of  God's 
nature : 

Higher  far  into  the  pure  realm, 

Over  sun  and  star, 

Over  the  flickering  Daemon  film, 

Thou  must  mount  for  love; 

Into  vision  where  all  form 

Into  one  only  form  dissolves; 

In  a  region  where  the  wheel 

On  which  all  beings  ride 

Visibly  revolves; 

Where  the  starred,  eternal  worm 

8  "  Mithridates."  «  "  Destiny." 


"  EVIL   GOOD,    AND    GOOD   EVIL  "  71 

Girds  the  world  with  bound  and  term; 
Where  unlike  things  are  like; 
Where  good  and  ill, 
And  joy  and  moan, 
Melt  into  one.7 


"  Woe  to  them  that  call  evil  good,  and  good  evil," 
said  the  ancient  prophet.  Yet  this  ignoring  of  sin  is 
the  fundamental  error  of  Emerson's  teaching.  There 
can  be  no  question  about  his  sincerity,  and  the  sweet- 
ness and  cheerfulness  of  his  disposition.  He  had  never 
experienced  serious  conflicts  with  his  own  nature,  and 
he  seldom,  if  ever,  was  conscious  of  moral  imperfec- 
tion. In  his  early  life  indeed  he  writes :  "  Milton  was 
enamored  of  moral  perfection.  He  did  not  love  it 
more  than  I.  That  which  I  cannot  declare  has  been 
my  angel  from  childhood  until  now.  It  has  separated 
me  from  men.  It  has  driven  sleep  from  my  bed.  It 
has  tortured  me  for  my  guilt.  It  has  inspired  me  with 
hope."  And  his  poem  entitled  "  Grace "  has  lines 
which  seem  almost  Christian : 

How  much,  preventing  God,  how  much  I  owe 
To  the  defences  thou  hast  round  me  set; 
Example,  custom,  fear,  occasion  slow, — 
These  scorned  bondmen  were  my  parapet. 
I  dare  not  peep  over  this  parapet 
To  gauge  with  glance  the  roaring  gulf  below, 
The  depths  of  sin  to  which  I  had  descended, 
Had  not  these  me  against  myself  defended! 

But  the  remedy  is  all  in  self  and  not  in  God.     Self, 
indeed,  is  an  effluence  and  manifestation  of  God : 

1  "  The  Celestial  Love." 


72  SALVATION  BY  CHARACTER 

So  nigh  is  grandeur  to  our  dust, 
So  near  is  God  to  man, 
When  Duty  whispers  low,  Thou  must, 
The  youth  replies,  /  can. 8 

"  The  essence  of  Christianity,"  he  says,  "  is  in  its 
practical  morals."  We  must  summon  up  our  better 
nature,  our  lofty  ideals,  our  strength  of  will : 

Freedom's  secret  wilt  thou  know? — 
Counsel  not  with  flesh  and  blood; 
Loiter  not  for  cloak  or  food; 
Right  thou  feelest,  rush  to  do.8 

There  is  little  comfort  here  for  the  sin-sick  and 
despairing.  Emerson  preaches  salvation  by  character, 
when  man's  first  need  is  salvation  from  character.  Yet 
we  must  concede  that  he  presents  a  winning  picture  of 
Pelagian  virtue.  Father  Taylor,  the  seaman's  preacher, 
was  severely  orthodox,  but  when  Emerson  died,  and 
some  one  intimated  a  doubt  of  his  eternal  fate,  Taylor 
gallantly  remarked :  "  Well,  if  Emerson  has  gone  to 
hell,  all  I  can  say  is  that  the  climate  will  speedily 
change,  and  immigration  will  rapidly  set  in.  He  might 
think  this  or  that,  but  he  was  more  like  Jesus  Christ 
than  any  one  I  have  ever  known.  The  devil  will  not 
know  what  to  do  with  him."  But  this  same  Father 
Taylor  gave  it  as  his  verdict  that  "  Emerson  knows  no 
more  of  the  religion  of  the  New  Testament  than 
Balaam's  ass  did  of  the  principles  of  Hebrew  gram- 
mar." 


8  "  Voluntaries.' 


THE    POET    THE    EMANCIPATED    MAN  73 


II 


All  that  I  have  said  thus  far  is  meant  as  an  intro- 
duction to  his  poetry,  and  to  the  understanding  of  its 
theological  significance.  Emerson's  conception  of 
poetry  will  help  us  here.  To  him  the  poet  was  the 
emancipated  man,  lifted  into  consciousness  of  his  divine 
Original,  with  insight  into  the  hidden  meaning  of  the 
world,  and  foresight  of  the  end  to  which  the  world  is 
hastening : 

The  free  winds  told  him  what  they  knew, 
Discoursed  of  fortune  as  they  blew; 

And  on  his  mind  at  dawn  of  day 
Soft  shadows  of  the  evening  lay.10 

But  he  does  not  regard  this  elevation  and  ecstasy  as 
peculiar  to  the  poet:  it  is  only  an  intensification  of 
moods  that  belong  at  times  to  the  common  man : 

In  the  deep  heart  of  man  a  poet  dwells 

Who  all  the  day  of  life  his  summer  story  tells.11 

For  this  reason  the  poet  appeals  to  the  universal 
heart  of  man ;  he  rouses  in  us  the  same  emotions  that 
swayed  himself;  he  teaches  us  the  habit  of  thinking 
for  ourselves.  Emerson  counted  among  "  the  traits 
common  to  all  works  of  the  highest  art  that  they  are 
universally  intelligible,  that  they  restore  to  us  the 
simplest  states  of  mind." 

10  "  The  Poet."  »  "  The  Enchanter." 

G 


74  CHARACTERISTICS    OF    TRUE    POETRY 

That  wit  and  joy  might  find  a  tongue, 
And  earth  grow  civil,  HOMER  sung.u 

To  clothe  the  fiery  thought 
In  simple  words  succeeds, 
For  still  the  craft  of  genius  is 
To  mask  a  king  in  weeds.13 

This  is  the  first  of  Milton's  essential  characteristics 
of  poetry:  it  must  be  "simple,  sensuous,  passionate." 
But  Emerson  is  not  true  to  his  own  principle.  He  is 
not  always  simple,  he  is  not  always  intelligible,  and  he 
is  generally  cold  in  temper  rather  than  impassioned. 
The  philosopher  and  the  seer  too  often  interfere  with 
the  poet.  He  must  needs  plunge  into  the  unknown, 
and  disclose  things  beyond  all  power  of  human  speech : 

Ever  the  Poet  from  the  land 
Steers  his  bark  and  trims  his  sail; 
Right  out  to  sea  his  courses  stand, 
New  worlds  to  find  in  pinnace  frail.u 

And  when  he  has  found  truth  undiscovered  before, 
he  must  give  it  utterance  in  ways  that  will  stir  men's 
hearts  by  their  novelty,  even  though  they  break  with 
every  tradition  of  meter  and  of  rhyme.  I  doubt 
whether  Emerson  was  ever  consciously  sensational,  but 
his  lordly  method  is  not  the  method  of  true  poetry, 
when  he  writes : 

Great  is  the  art, 

Great  be  the  manners,  of  the  bard. 
He  shall  not  his  brain  encumber 
With  the  coil  of  rhythm  and  number; 
But,  leaving  rule  and  pale  forethought, 

w  "  Quatrains."  M  "  Quatrains." 


SUBSTANCE    WITHOUT    FORM    IN    EMERSON  75 

He  shall  aye  climb 

For  his  rhyme. 

'  Pass  in,  pass  in/  the  angels  say, 

'  In  to  the  upper  doors, 

Nor  count  compartments  of  the  floors, 

But  mount  to  paradise 

By  the  stairway  of  surprise.' 1B 

We  have  seen  that  Emerson  had  no  ear  for  music. 
It  is  also  plain  that  he  never  grappled  with  metrical 
problems,  or  realized  that  the  laws  of  harmony  are 
laws  of  God.  He  can  make  such  imperfect  rhymes 
as  worm  and  form,  pans  and  romance,  feeble  and  peo- 
ple, abroad  and  Lord,  sodden  and  forgotten,  hear  and 
are,  shrine  and  within.  There  is  a  jerkiness  and  dis- 
sonance about  many  of  his  verses  which  reveal  a 
fundamental  artistic  defect,  as  well  as  a  careless  au- 
dacity. We  must  credit  him  with  the  substance  of 
poetry,  but  must  deny  that  he  has  mastered  its  form. 
He  is  a  stranger  to  the  melody  of  Shelley ;  and,  though 
Goethe  was  one  of  his  demigods,  that  supreme  literary 
artist  did  not  influence  him  to  follow  his  example. 
The  result  is  an  obscure  and  disjointed  verse,  with  occa- 
sional bursts  of  trumpetlike  and  thrilling  beauty ;  while 
the  real  power  of  his  writing  is  to  be  found  mainly  in 
his. prose.  I  cannot  assent  to  Stedman's  characteriza- 
tion of  him  as  "  our  most  typical  and  inspiring  poet." 
Theodore  Parker  called  Emerson  "  a  poet  lacking  the 
accomplishment  of  verse  " — which  means  that  his  gift 
was  that  of  poetical  prose.  Matthew  Arnold  said  well 
that  Emerson's  is  the  most  important  work  of  the 
nineteenth  century  in  prose,  as  Wordsworth's  is  the 


76  EMERSON'S  IDEA  OF  GOD 

most  important  work  of  that  same  century  in  poetry; 
and  to  that  estimate  we  may  well  subscribe. 

When  I  seek  to  illustrate  Emerson's  theological  ideas 
by  citations  from  his  verse,  I  am  met  with  the  ever-out- 
standing fact  that  all  his  poetry  is  an  endless  reiteration 
of  one  great  truth,  together  with  an  ignoring  of  the 
other  truth  which  prevents  it  from  having  all  the  effect 
of  error.  There  is  a  pendulum  swing  in  human 
thought.  Divinity  and  humanity,  fate  and  freedom, 
each  has  its  rights.  Woe  be  to  the  age  that  builds  its 
system  of  thought  upon  either  one  to  the  exclusion  of 
the  other !  The  pendulum  will  certainly  swing  to  the 
opposite  extreme.  New  England  had  become  Armin- 
ian  and  sterile ;  the  fountains  of  the  great  deep  needed 
to  be  broken  up;  Emerson  showed  us  an  open  heaven 
and  a  present  God.  In  this  he  did  a  service  to  his 
generation.  "  Unlovely,  nay,  frightful,"  he  says,  "  is 
the  solitude  of  the  soul  without  God."  But  this  recog- 
nition passes  immediately  into  identification.  The  soul 
that  recognizes  God  becomes  itself  God,  and  God  him- 
self becomes  another  name  for  our  human  life  and 
activity : 

This  is  Jove,  who,  deaf  to  prayers, 
Floods  with  blessings  unawares. 
Draw,  if  thou  canst,  the  mystic  line 
Severing  rightly  his  from  thine, 
Which  is  human,  which  divine. 

What  God  is  this,  who  cannot  or  will  not  hear  the 
prayers  of  his  worshipers  and  who  is  indistinguishable 
from  ourselves  ?  This  is  indeed  the  Roman  Jove ;  it  is 
not  our  Father  who  is  in  heaven.  The  pagan  God  is 
not  God  at  all,  but  only  an  idol  of  the  human  imagi- 


EMERSON  S    VIEW    OF    PRAYER  77 

nation,  a  creation  of  our  human  selfishness  and  sin. 
The  blessings  with  which  he  floods  us  unawares  come 
from  no  mind  of  justice  or  heart  of  love.  No  com- 
munion with  him  is  possible;  he  is  simply  the  imper- 
sonal spirit  of  the  universe,  the  nature-god  of  panthe- 
ism, a  god  who  has  no  eye  to  pity  and  no  arm  to  save 
in  the  stern  emergencies  of  men's  need. 

What  was  Emerson's  doctrine  of  prayer?  He  cer- 
tainly did  not  believe  in  petition  for  specific  gifts  or 
blessings.  That,  to  his  mind,  would  be  impudence,  and 
insult  to  law  and  Lawgiver.  "  Prayer  that  craves 
a  particular  commodity,  anything  less  than  all  good,  is 
vicious."  "  Men's  prayers  are  a  disease  of  the  will,  as 
their  creeds  are  a  disease  of  the  intellect."  Yet  prayer 
is  natural  to  man ;  it  may  lift  him  into  harmony  with 
the  divine  will ;  it  may  give  him  new  insight  and  cour- 
age. It  will  be  sheer  perversion  to  expect  any  alter- 
ation in  things  external  to  ourselves.  Emerson  gave 
up  public  prayer,  as  he  gave  up  the  Lord's  Supper,  be- 
cause he  regarded  it  as  encouraging  superstition : 

When  success  exalts  thy  lot, 
God  for  thy  virtue  lays  a  plot: 
And  all  thy  life  is  for  thine  own, 
Then  for  mankind's  instruction  shown; 
And  though  thy  knees  were  never  bent, 
To  Heaven  thy  hourly  prayers  are  sent, 
And  whether  formed  for  good  or  ill, 
Are  registered  and  answered  still.18 

O,  when  I  am  safe  in  my  sylvan  home, 
I  tread  on  the  pride  of  Greece  and  Rome; 
For  what  are  they  all,  in  their  high  conceit, 
When  man  in  the  bush  with  God  may  meet?" 

i«  "  prayer."  »  "  Good-bye." 


78  THE    "  PISTAREEN    PROVIDENCE  " 

In  the  name  of  Godhead,  I 
The  morrow  front,  and  can  defy; 
Though  I  am  weak,  yet  God,  when  prayed, 
Cannot  withhold  his  conquering  aid.u 

But  God's  "  conquering  aid  "  is  really  nothing  but  the 
new  determination  of  the  human  soul,  and  God  is  but 
a  figure  of  speech : 

Around  the  man  who  seeks  a  noble  end, 
Not  angels  but  divinities  attend.19 

Emerson  scoffs  at  the  "  pistareen  Providence  "  of 
George  Miiller  and  his  Orphan  Houses.  Piety,  he 
thinks,  is  here  "  pulled  down  to  the  pantry  and  the 
shoe-closet,  till  we  are  distressed  for  fresh  air,  God 
coming  precisely  as  he  is  called  for,  to  the  hour  and 
minute."  Yet  Jesus  said,  "  Ask,  and  ye  shall  receive  " ; 
and  Paul  urges  us,  "  in  everything  by  prayer  and  sup- 
plication with  thanksgiving,"  to  let  our  "  requests  be 
made  known  unto  God."  Emerson's  God  does  not 
hear  and  cannot  answer  prayer. 

He  spoke  of  "  the  burdensome  doctrine  of  a  Deity." 
But  he  meant  only  to  clear  himself  of  definitions,  and  to 
accept  whatever  impressions  came  to  him,  mutually 
contradictory  though  they  might  be.  This  gives  an 
appearance  of  fairness  to  his  writings,  though  it  really 
shows  that  he  had  no  settled  belief  with  regard  to  the 
most  serious  questions  that  vex  the  soul.  "  Cannot 
I  trust  the  Goodness  that  has  uplifted  to  uphold  me?  " 
he  says.  "  I  cannot  find  in  the  world,  without  or 
within,  any  antidote,  any  bulwark,  against  this  fear, 

18  "  The  Nun's  Aspiration."  19  "  Life." 


TRUTH    WHAT    MEN    TROW  79 

like  this :  the  frank  acknowledgment  of  unbounded  de- 
pendence. Let  into  the  heart  that  is  rilled  with  pros- 
perity the  idea  of  God,  and  it  smooths  the  giddy  preci- 
pices of  human  pride  to  a  substantial  level."  He  can 
even  acknowledge  "  the  wholesomeness  of  Calvinism 
for  thousands  and  thousands.  I  would  not  discourage 
their  scrupulous  religious  observances."  Calvinism,  he 
holds,  "  is  an  imperfect  version  of  the  moral  law.  Uni- 
tarianism  is  another."  "  It  is  well  for  my  Protestantism 
that  there  is  no  Cathedral  in  Concord.  Unitarians  for- 
get that  men  are  poets.  .  .  I  have  very  good  grounds  for 
being  a  Unitarian,  and  for  being  a  Trinitarian  too.  .  . 
The  highest  revelation  is  that  God  is  in  every  man. 
Our  reason  is  not  to  be  distinguished  from  the  divine 
essence ;  and  all  forms  of  doctrine  are  but  shadows  and 
symbols  of  invisible  reality." 

Ever  the  Rock  of  Ages  melts 

Into  the  mineral  air, 
To  be  the  quarry  whence  to  build 

Thought  and  its  mansions  fair. 

Ascending  through  just  degrees 
To  a  consummate  holiness, 
As  angel  blind  to  trespass  done, 
And  bleaching  all  souls  like  the  sun.20 

Oh  what  is  Heaven  but  the  fellowship 
Of  minds  that  each  can  stand  against  the 

world 
By  its  own  meek  and  incorruptible  will?21 

On  this  theory,  truth  is  simply  what  men  "  trow,"  and 
things  are  what  men  "  think."  All  reality  is  subjective. 

20  "  Life."  a  "  Self-reliance,"  lines  added  in   1833. 


80  THE    INFINITUDE   OF    A    MAN 

In  spite  of  these  shortcomings,  Emerson's  positive 
doctrine  was  a  blessing  to  New  England.  "  The  in- 
finitude of  the  private  man,"  and  the  possibility  of  his 
first-hand  acquaintance  with  the  Deity,  were  lessons 
which  the  church  and  the  world  greatly  needed  to  learn. 
Sacraments  and  Bible  were  never  intended  as  a  substi- 
tute for  direct  communion  with  Christ.  Much  that 
our  author  says  of  God  in  the  soul,  and  of  the  soul's 
expression  of  God  in  the  world,  is  capable  of  a  Chris- 
tian interpretation.  Emerson  never  reaches  a  greater 
height  of  imaginative  fervor  than  in  his  poem  entitled 
"  The  Problem,"  and  this  alone  will  give  him  enduring 
fame,  when  other  works  of  his  are  forgotten,  though 
even  here  there  is  mingled  with  a  noble  recognition  of 
God's  working  in  humanity  a  fatal  denial  of  any 
worth  in  the  externals  of  religion : 

I  like  a  church;  I  like  a  cowl; 

I  love  a  prophet  of  the  soul; 

And  on  my  heart  monastic  aisles 

Fall  like  sweet  strains,  or  pensive  smiles: 

Yet  not  for  all  his  faith  can  see 

Would  I  that  cowled  chufchman  be. 


The  hand  that  rounded  Peter's  dome 
And  groined  the  aisles  of  Christian  Rome 
Wrought  in  a  sad  sincerity; 
Himself  from  God  he  could  not  free; 
He  builded  better  than  he  knew; — 
The  conscious  stone  to  beauty  grew. 


These  temples  grew  as  grows  the  grass; 
Art  might  obey,  but  not  surpass. 
The  passive  Master  lent  his  hand 
To  the  vast  soul  that  o'er  him  planned; 


SLIGHTING   ALLUSIONS    TO    CHRIST  8 1 

And  the  same  power  that  reared  the  shrine 
Bestrode  the  tribes  that  knelt  within. 
Ever  the  fiery  Pentecost 
Girds  with  one  flame  the  countless  host. 

One  accent  of  the  Holy  Ghost 
The  heedless  world  hath  never  lost. 

And  yet,  for  all  his  faith  could  see, 
I  would  not  the  good  bishop  be. 

The  final  test  of  a  poet's  worth  must  be  his  concep- 
tion of  Christ.  By  his  attitude  toward  our  Lord  he 
will  be  judged  at  the  last  day,  and  by  that  standard 
Christian  people  must  judge  him  now.  He  who  does 
not  accept  Christ  as  Lord  of  all  fails  to  recognize  him 
as  Lord  at  all.  To  a  Christian  heart,  Emerson's 
slighting  and  half -contemptuous  allusions  to  Jesus  are 
deeply  painful.  He  seems  to  take  pleasure  in  tearing 
the  crown  from  the  brow  of  our  Redeemer.  "  My 
brothers,  my  mother,  my  companions,  must  be  much 
more  to  me,  in  all  respects  of  friendship,  than  he  can 
be."  He  regards  the  incarnation  as  poorly  expressing 
the  eternal  indwelling  of  God  in  man.  He  had  wished 
that  his  son 

Might  break  his  daily  bread 
With  prophet,  savior  and  head; 
That  he  might  cherish  for  his  own 
The  riches  of  sweet  Mary's  Son, 
Boy-Rabbi,  Israel's  paragon.22 

Christianity,   he  acknowledges,   is   "  the  most  em 
phatic  affirmation  of  man's  spiritual  nature.     But  not 

23  "  Threnody." 


82  JESUS    RANKED    WITH    THE    GREAT 

the  only  one,  nor  the  last.  There  shall  be  a  thou- 
sand more." 

For  what  need  I  of  book  or  priest, 
Or  sibyl  from  the  mummied  East, 
When  every  star  is  Bethlehem  star? 
I  count  as  many  as  there  are 
Cinquefoils  or  violets  in  the  grass, 
So  many  saints  and  saviors, 
So  many  high  behaviors 
Salute  the  bard  who  is  alive 
And  only  sees  what  he  doth  give.23 

Emerson  ranks  Jesus  among  the  great  men  of  the 
races.  Christian  associations,  he  says,  are  "  the  fruit 
of  the  life  and  teachings  of  the  lowly  Nazarene.  An 
obscure  man,  in  an  obscure  crowd,  brought  forward 
a  new  Scripture.  His  cross  has  been  erected,  and  it 
has  been  to  some  a  pillar  of  cloud,  and  to  some  a  pillar 
of  fire."  But  he  puts  our  Lord  side  by  side  with  Plato 
and  Philo  and  Shakespeare : 

One  in  a  Judaean  manger, 

And  one  by  Avon  stream, 

One  over  against  the  mouths  of  Nile, 

And  one  in  the  Academe.24 

I  see  all  human  wits 
Are  measured  by  a  few; 
Unmeasured  still  my  Shakspeare  sits, 
Lone  as  the  blessed  Jew.25 

If  Emerson  had  taken  conscience  instead  of  nature 
for  his  guide,  he  would  have  found  the  key  to  the 
world's  great  problem,  and  would  have  appreciated 
the  solution  which  is  furnished  in  Jesus  Christ,  for 

**  "  The  Poet."  24  "  Song  of  Nature,"  M  "  Shakspeare." 


"  JESUS    WOULD   ABSORB    THE    RACE  "  83 

the  revelation  of  saving  love  in  Jesus  Christ  is  the  only 
remedy  for  the  world's  guilt  and  misery.  But  Emer- 
son could  see  in  Christ  only  the  likeness  of  himself.  He 
speaks  condescendingly  of  "  that  best  and  dearest 
saint,"  "  that  excellent  teacher  whom  God  sent,"  "  not 
a  solitary,  but  still  a  lovely  herald  " ;  but  he  discoun- 
tenances the  "  noxious  exaggeration  of  the  person  of 
Jesus,"  and  he  banished  that  person  from  genuine 
religion.  He  praises  "  the  lowliness  of  the  blessed 
soul  that  walked  in  Judea  and  hallowed  that  land  for- 
ever " ;  but  he  thought  he  could  not  himself  be  a  man, 
if  he  "  must  subordinate  his  nature  to  Christ's  nature." 
"Jesus  would  absorb  the  race,"  he  said,  "but  Tom 
Paine,  or  the  coarsest  blasphemer,  helps  humanity  by 
resisting  this  exuberance  of  power."  He  failed  to  see 
that  Jesus  not  only  absorbs  but  transforms,  and  that 
we  grow,  only  by  the  impact  of  nobler  souls  than  our 
own.  The  age-long  yearning  of  the  human  race  for 
God  in  human  form  made  no  impression  on  him. 
"  That  exalted  person  who  died  on  Calvary,"  he  thinks, 
"  will  be  better  loved  by  not  being  adored."  "  Only  a 
barbarous  state  of  society  thought  to  add  to  his  dignity 
by  making  him  King,  and  God." 

Emerson  broke  with  his  church  and  left  the  .ministry 
because  he  could  not  celebrate  the  Lord's  Supper — it 
implied  a  profounder  reverence  for  Jesus  than  he  could 
give  him.  "  It  seemed  to  me  at  church  to-day,"  he 
says,  "  that  the  communion  service,  as  it  is  now  and 
here  celebrated,  is  a  document  of  the  dulness  of  the 
race.  How  these,  my  good  neighbors,  the  bending 
deacons,  with  their  cups  and  plates,  would  have 
straightened  themselves  to  sturdiness,  if  the  proposition 


84  "  MANY    SAINTS    AND    SAVIORS  " 

came  before  them  to  honor  thus  a  fellow  man !  "  Yes, 
verily!  And  it  was  only  common  honesty  on  Emer- 
son's part,  when  he  came  to  regard  Jesus  as  only  one 
of  "  many  saints  and  saviors,"  to  give  up  his  clerical 
office  and  thenceforth  substitute  the  lecture  platform 
for  the  pulpit.  His  teaching  was  no  longer  "  crip- 
pled by  making  it  depend  on  Jesus."  But  it  also  be- 
came merely  the  fallible  message  of  a  human  seer, 
instead  of  the  power  of  God  unto  salvation.  Of  him- 
self he  said  well,  "  I  find  in  me  no  enthusiasm,  no 
resources,  for  the  instruction  and  guidance  of  the 
people." 

A  Nature-God  cannot  hate  evil,  for  it  is  his  creation, 
and  a  preliminary  and  partial  manifestation  of  his  own 
being.  Though  Emerson  has  been  called  the  teacher  of 
Puritan  ethics,  as  Jonathan  Edwards  was  the  teacher 
of  Puritan  religion,  it  would  be  difficult  to  mention  any 
principle  more  subversive  of  morals  than  is  Emerson's 
dictum  that  moral  evil  is  only  privative,  as  darkness  is 
only  the  absence  of  light.  Sin  is  no  longer  the  positive 
assertion  of  a  godless  will,  but  is  merely  the  absence 
of  knowledge,  the  effect  of  ignorance,  to  be  removed 
by  education.  It  is  not  enmity  to  God,  or  even  unlike- 
ness  to  him.  God  is  no  longer  holy,  since  sin  is  or- 
dained by  him  as  a  means  of  ultimate  perfection.  The 
selfishness  and  pride  and  hate  and  lust  of  man  are  only 
good  in  the  making;  the  stumbling  of  the  child  in  order 
that  he  may  learn  to  walk.  Emerson  becomes,  like 
Carlyle,  a  worshiper  of  successful  force.  Whatever  is, 
is  right,  and  his  optimism  can  find  good  in  Cain  and  in 
Judas.  His  poem  entitled  "  Cupido "  is  a  practical 
avowal  of  this  pantheism : 


WORSHIP    OF    SUCCESSFUL    FORCE  85 

The  solid,  solid  universe 

Is  pervious  to  Love; 

With  bandaged  eyes  he  never  errs, 

Around,  below,  above. 

His  blinding  light 

He  flingeth  white 

On  God's  and  Satan's  brood, 

And  reconciles 

By  mystic  wiles 

The  evil  and  the  good. 

In  his  "  Xenophanes  "  he  propounds  this  same  doc- 
trine of  absolute  unity  in  its  most  extreme  form : 

All  things 

Are  of  one  pattern  made;  bird,  beast  and  flower, 
Song,  picture,  form,  space,  thought  and  character 
Deceive  us,  seeming  to  be  many  things, 
And  are  but  one.    Beheld  far  off,  they  part 
As  God  and  devil;  bring  them  to  the  mind, 
They  dull  its  edge  with  their  monotony. 
To  know  one  element,  explore  another, 
And  in  the  second  reappears  the  first. 

Over  me  soared  the  eternal  sky, 

Full  of  light  and  of  deity; 

Again  I  saw,  again  I  heard, 

The  rolling  river,  the  morning  bird; — 

Beauty  through  my  senses i  stole; 

I  yielded  myself  to  the  perfect  whole.26 

All  this  means,  not  that  the  world  is  the  symbol  of 
spirit,  but  that  the  world  is  spirit.  "  God  is  the  life 
of  all.  Every  mountain  is  a  Sinai ;  every  tree  a  burn- 
ing bush ;  every  breeze  a  still,  small  voice.  Each  soul  is 
an  expression  of  the  Over-Soul,  and  reigns  supreme 
over  matter."  As  positive  and  negative  are  two  in- 

26  "  Each  and  All." 


86  "  BRAHMA  " 

separable  poles  of  the  magnet,  so  matter  and  mind, 
good  and  evil,  are  alike  manifestations  of  the  universal 
Spirit.  The  poem  "  Cupido,"  in  spite  of  its  poetical 
beauty,  and  of  the  Christian  interpretation  which  may 
be  given  to  its  opening  lines,  is  Hindu  and  pagan  in 
essence.  The  author's  poem  "  Brahma  "  indeed  is  only 
a  rendering  in  English  of  that  heathen  and  immoral 
philosophy : 

If  the  red  slayer  think  he  slays, 
Or  if  the  slain  think  he  is  slain, 

They  know  not  well  the  subtle  ways 
I  keep,  and  pass,  and  turn  again. 

Far  or  forgot  to  me  is  near; 

Shadow  and  sunlight  are  the  same; 
The  vanished  gods  to  me  appear; 

And  one  to  me  are  shame  and  fame. 

They  reckon  ill  who  leave  me  out; 

When  me  they  fly,  I  am  the  wings; 
I  am  the  doubter  and  the  doubt, 

And  I  the  hymn  the  Brahmin  sings. 

The  strong  gods  pine  for  my  abode, 
And  pine  in  vain  the  sacred  Seven; 

But  thou,  meek  lover  of  the  good! 

Find  me,  and  turn  thy  back  on  heaven. 

What  is  this  but  a  confounding  of  all  moral  dis- 
tinctions? We  should  not  wish  never  to  have  sinned, 
for  sin  is  necessary  to  the  development  of  holiness. 
"  For  the  intellect,"  Emerson  says,  "  there  is  no  crime. 
.  .  Saints  are  sad,  because  they  behold  sin  from  the 
point  of  view  of  the  conscience,  and  not  of  the  intel- 
lect— a  confusion  of  thought.  .  .  Man,  though  in 
brothels  or  jails,  or  on  gibbets,  is  on  his  way  to  all 
that  is  good  and  true.  .  .  The  carrion  that  rots  in  the 


AMALGAMATION    OF    HEAVEN    AND    HELL  87 

sun,  the  criminal  who  breaks  every  law  of  God  and 
man,  are  on  their  way  to  blessedness.  Evil  is  part 
of  the  discipline  by  which  the  soul  is  restored  to  union 
with  the  Over-Soul.  The  less  we  have  to  do  with  our 
sins,  the  better.  No  man  can  afford  to  waste  his  mo- 
ments in  compunctions."  All  evil  is  undeveloped  good. 
This  has  been  well  called  "  the  higher  synthesis  of 
the  Devil  and  the  Deity."  If  Emerson  is  not  worthy 
of  the  title,  which  Carlyle  invented  for  another,  of 
"  President  of  the  Heaven  and  Hell  Amalgamation 
Society,"  he  certainly  can  be  said  to  have  devised  an 
excuse  for  all  human  passion,  and  a  slander  upon  the 
holiness  of  God. 

When  individual  men  become  mere  figureheads  and 
automata  for  the  divine  in  working,  they  cease  to  be 
objects  of  our  special  regard.  Emerson  confessed  his 
inability  to  enter  into  intimate  personal  relations  with 
others.  His  friendships  were  of  the  cool  intellectual 
sort ;  "  there  were  fences  between  him  and  his  dearest 
friends  " ;  he  was  slow  to  appreciate  or  to  advocate  the 
cause  of  the  slave;  he  cared  for  man  in  the  abstract 
rather  than  for  real  men.  The  only  God  he  knew 
was  within  his  own  soul.  Paul  declared  that  all  things 
are  ours  because  we  enter  into  Christ's  inheritance; 
Emerson  held  that  all  things  are  ours  by  original  right, 
and  that  Christ  enters  into  our  inheritance  instead : 

I  am  owner  of  the  sphere, 
Of  the  seven  stars  and  the  solar  year, 
Of  Cassar's  hand,  and  Plato's  brain, 
Of  Lord  Christ's  heart,  and  Shakespeare's 
strain.27 

27  Motto  to  the  "  Essay  on  History." 


88  MAN  WRONGED 

"  In  self-trust,"  he  said,  "  all  the  virtues  are  com- 
pounded. Man  has  been  wronged;  men  are  of  no 
account.  The  human  mind  cannot  be  enshrined  in  a 
person  who  shall  set  a  barrier  on  any  one  side  to  this 
unbounded,  unboundable  empire."  He  questions  the 
ethics  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  One  must  not  be 
hindered  by  consideration  for  others.  The  true  end 
of  being  is  development  of  the  self.  This  seems 
dangerously  near  to  Paul's  description  of  "  the  man  of 
sin,"  who  "  sits  in  the  temple  of  God,  setting  himself 
forth  as  God."  It  is  the  "  Overman  "  of  Nietzsche, 
claiming  the  right  to  realize  self  and  to  put  down  all 
that  stands  in  his  way.  It  is  the  view  of  Ibsen,  who,  in 
"  The  Doll's  House,"  makes  Nora  put  self-realization 
before  wifehood  and  motherhood.  "  Obligation  to 
put  all  poor  men  into  good  situations  ?  "  says  Emer- 
son. "Are  they  my  poor?  .  .  I  grudge  the  dollar, 
the  dime,  the  cent,  I  give  to  such  men  as  do  not  belong 
to  me,  and  to  whom  I  do  not  belong."  The  least  and 
lowest  of  all  the  sons  of  men  had  worth  enough  for 
Jesus  to  make  him  willing  to  suffer  and  die  in  his 
behalf.  The  parable  of  the  Good  Samaritan  showed 
who  is  my  neighbor.  But  the  evangelization  of  men 
did  not  interest  Emerson.  He  was  greatly  amused 
that  the  American  Baptist  Missionary  Union  attempted 
the  conversion  of  France;  and  when  asked  what  he 
would  do  with  the  Hottentots  of  Africa,  he  replied, 
"  Just  what  I  would  do  with  one  of  their  ant-hills — 
step  on  it."  And  in  his  poem  "  Alphonso  "  he  writes : 

•  Earth,  crowded,  cries,  'Too  many  men!' 
My  counsel  is,  Kill  nine  in  ten, 


EMERSON'S  DEBT  TO  CHRIST  89 

And  bestow  the  shares  of  all 
On  the  remnant  decimal. 

So  shall  ye  have  a  man  of  the  sphere, 
Fit  to  grace  the  solar  year. 

And  yet,  all  of  Emerson's  optimism,  his  recognition 
of  God  in  nature,  his  love  of  country,  his  hope  for  the 
future,  were  drawn  from  Christ.  These  things  were 
not,  before  Christ  came.  It  is  Christ  who  has  glorified 
nature  and  man;  it  is  he  who  has  inspired  hope  for 
the  individual  and  for  society.  The  classic  writers 
were  pessimists ;  to  them  the  world  seemed  given  over 
to  evil,  and  to  be  nearing  destruction.  Apocalypticism 
was  only  the  reflection  in  religious  minds  of  such 
fears  as  possessed  Cicero  and  Seneca.  The  very- 
dignity  of  man,  which  Emerson  fancied  to  be  his 
peculiar  message  and  discovery,  was  the  revelation  of 
Him  who  thought  each  human  soul  of  such  worth  that 
he  died  to  save  it.  On  this  ladder  Emerson  has  climbed 
to  his  calm  faith  in  the  divine  indwelling  and  in  man's 
certainty  of  progress.  It  was  blindness  and  ingrati- 
tude in  him  to  throw  down  the  ladder  by  which  he  had 
climbed. 

Let  us  be  thankful  for  the  truth  he  utters,  though 
he  is  far  from  uttering  the  whole  truth  and  nothing  but 
the  truth.  We  owe  much  to  him  for  his  insight  into 
the  meaning  of  nature.  There  is  a  spirit  in  matter; 
nothing  in  this  world  is  dead;  every  leaf  and  every 
breeze  is  symbolic;  God  speaks  to  us  in  the  heavens 
above  and  in  the  earth  beneath : 

Thou  canst  not  wave  thy  staff  in  air, 
Or  dip  thy  paddle  in  the  lake, 
H 


QO  INSIGHT    INTO    MEANING    OF    NATURE 

But  it  carves  the  bow  of  beauty  there, 
And  the  ripples  in  rhymes  the  oar  forsake. 
The  wood  is  wiser  far  than  thou; 
The  wood  and  wave  each  other  know 
Not  unrelated,  unaffied, 
But  to  each  thought  and  thing  allied, 
Is  perfect  Nature's  every  part, 
Rooted  in  the  mighty  Heart. 


Behind  thee  leave  thy  merchandise, 

Thy  churches  and  thy  charities; 

And  leave  thy  peacock  wit  behind; 

Enough  for  thee  the  primal  mind 

That  flows  in  streams,  that  breathes  in  wind; 

Leave  all  thy  pedant  lore  apart;      - 

God  hid  the  whole  world  in  thy  heart. 

All  the  forms  are  fugitive, 

But  the  substances  survive. 

Ever  fresh  the  broad  creation, 

A  divine  improvisation, 

From  the  heart  of  God  proceeds, 

A  single  will,  a  million  deeds.28 

There  are  snatches  and  bursts  of  melody  in  the  midst 
of  tame  and  rambling  verse,  such  as : 

Announced  by  all  the  trumpets  of  the  sky 
Come  see  the  north  wind's  masonry. 

The  frolic  architecture  of  the  snow.29 

For  the  world  was  built  in  order, 
And  the  atoms  march  in  tune; 
Rhyme  the  pipe,  and  Time  the  warder, 
The  sun  obeys  them  and  the  moon.30 

28  "  Woodnotes,"  II.  w  "  The  Snow-storm."  M  "  Monadnoc." 


BURSTS    OF    MELODY  9 1 

Brother,  sweeter  is  the  Law 
Than  all  the  grace  Love  ever  saw; 
We  are  its  suppliants.    By  it,  we 
Draw  the  breath  of  Eternity.31 

For  the  prevision  is  allied 
Unto  the  thing  so  signified; 
Or  say,  the  foresight  that  awaits 
Is  the  same  Genius  that  creates.32 

The  sun  set,  but  set  not  his  hope: — 
Stars  rose,  his  faith  was  earlier  up: 
Fixed  on  the  enormous  galaxy, 
Deeper  and  older  seemed  his  eye, 
And  matched  his  sufferance  sublime 
The  taciturnity  of  Time.33 

'Tis  not  in  the  high  stars  alone, 
Nor  in  the  cup  of  budding  flowers, 
Nor  in  the  redbreast's  mellow  tone, 
Nor  in  the  bow  that  smiles  in  showers, 
But  in  the  mud  and  scum  of  things 
There  alway,  alway  something  sings.34 

What  Emerson  says  of  Goethe  we  may  well  apply 
to  himself : 

Is  he  hapless  who  can  spare 
In  his  plenty  things  so  rare? 

With  his  view  that  man  is  immediately  inspired  by 
God,  Emerson  may  be  expected  to  be  an  apostle  of 
human  freedom.  And  so  he  is,  if  we  look  at  man  in 
the  abstract,  for  individual  men  did  not  seem  to  him 
so  worthy  of  his  notice. 

On  prince  or  bride  no  diamond  stone 
Half  so  gracious  ever  shone, 
As  the  light  of  enterprise 
Beaming  from  a  young  man's  eyes.38 

81  "  The  Poet."  3a  "  Fate."  ffl  "  The  Poet." 

34  "  Music."  35  Translations. 


92        APOSTLE  OF  ABSTRACT  FREEDOM 

Ever  in  the  strife  of  your  own  thoughts 
Obey  the  nobler  impulse;  that  is  Rome: 
That  shall  command  a  senate  to  your  side; 
For  there  is  no  might  in  the  universe 
That  can  contend  with  love.    It  reigns  forever.' 

The  hero  is  not  fed  on  sweets, 
•     Daily  his  own  heart  he  eats; 
Chambers  of  the  great  are  jails, 
And  head-winds  right  for  royal  sails.37 

He  that  feeds  men  serveth  few; 
He  serves  all  who  dares  be  true.38 

O  tenderly  the  haughty  day 

Fills  his  blue  urn  with  fire; 
One  morn  is  in  the  mighty  heaven, 

And  one  in  our  desire.  .  . 

For  He  that  worketh  high  and  wise, 

Nor  pauses  in  his  plan, 
Will  take  the  sun  out  of  the  skies 

Ere  freedom  out  of  man.38 


The  "  Boston  Hymn,"  read  in  the  Music  Hall,  January 
i,  1863,  is  a  stirring  eulogy  of  American  liberty: 

The  word  of  the  Lord  by  night 
To  the  watching  Pilgrims  came, 
As  they  sat  by  the  seaside, 
And  filled  their  hearts  with  flame. 

God  said,  I  am  tired  of  kings, 
I  suffer  them  no  more; 
Up  to  my  ear  the  morning  brings 
The  outrage  of  the  poor. 


Written  at  Rome."  "  "  Heroism." 

The  Celestial  Love."  »  "  Ode  "  at  Concord. 


EMERSON    NOT    A    CONTROVERSIALIST  93 

Come,  East  and  West  and  North, 
By  races,  as  snow-flakes, 
And  carry  my  purpose  forth, 
Which  neither  halts  nor  shakes. 

My  will  fulfilled  shall  be, 
For,  in  daylight  or  in  dark, 
My  thunderbolt  has  eyes  to  see 
His  way  home  to  the  mark. 

He  wrote  an  "  Inscription  for  a  Well  in  Memory  of 
the  Martyrs  of  the  War  " : 

Fall,  stream,  from  Heaven  to  bless;  return  as  well; 
So  did  our  sons;  Heaven  met  them  as  they  fell. 

Though  love  repine,  and  reason  chafe, 
There  came  a  voice  without  reply, — 
'  'Tis  man's  perdition  to  be  safe, 
When  for  the  truth  he  ought  to  die.'  *° 

But  conflict  was  not  our  poet's  native  air.  He  was 
no  reasoner  and  no  controversialist.  It  took  him  a 
long  time  to  realize  that  secession  and  rebellion  in  our 
Southern  States  must  be  put  down.  It  has  some- 
times been  said  that  he  was  never  angry,  and  his 
unvarying  serenity  has  been  used  to  disparage  our 
Lord's  denunciations  of  Scribes  and  Pharisees.  Such 
praise  is  virtual  condemnation;  for  real  love  for  the 
good  is  inseparable  from  indignation  against  the  evil. 
The  true  God  is  not  indifferent  to  moral  relations — 
he  is  a  God  of  fearful  justice,  of  awful  purity,  of 
searching  love,  and  holiness  is  fundamental  in  his  be- 
ing. Frothingham,  in  his  "  Transcendentalism  in  New 
England,"  intimates  that  Emerson  was  not  devoid  of 
indignation  against  wrong,  and  tells  us  that  he  could 

*«  "  Sacrifice." 


94  SWEETNESS    AND    BENIGNITY 

imitate  Jesus'  doom  of  the  barren  fig  tree.  He  cer- 
tainly denounced  Daniel  Webster  and  spoke  of  that 
"  filthy  Fugitive  Slave  Law,"  which  Webster  com- 
mended to  New  England.  When  Sumner  was  smit- 
ten, he  said,  "  I  think  we  must  get  rid  of  slavery,  or 
we  must  get  rid  of  freedom."  But  such  wrath  was 
exceedingly  rare.  Henry  James  remarks  that  Emer- 
son "  never  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  cherubim  and  the 
flaming  sword,  but  put  forth  his  hand  direct  to  the  tree 
of  life."  Sweetness  and  benignity  characterized  his 
common  demeanor.  He  moved  among  men  as  one 
whose  head  was  in  the  clouds,  and  who  was  oblivious 
of  the  petty  jangling  and  contention  of  sublunary 
affairs.  He  dealt  with  principles  rather  than  with 
details,  with  pure  rather  than  with  applied  science. 
"  I  live  wholly  from  within,"  he  said.  John  Morley 
classes  him  with  Rousseau,  Robespierre,  and  Carlyle, 
as  "  beginning  with  sentiment  and  ignoring  reason  " ; 
as  having  "  great  feeling  for  right,  but  also  great  con- 
tempt for  the  only  instruments  by  which  we  can  make 
sure  what  right  is."  And  we  may  add  that  Emerson 
would  have  been  less  tranquil,  but  more  useful,  if  he 
had  recognized  an  external  divine  revelation.  He  saw 
"  no  urgent  necessity  for  Heaven's  last  revelation, 
since  the  laws  of  morality  had  been  written  before, 
and  philosophy  had  lively  dreams  of  immortality." 
Here  we  see  that  our  poet  conceived  of  Christianity, 
not  as  God's  gift  of  pardon  for  the  violation  of  law, 
nor  as  God's  gift  of  power  to  obey  law,  but  solely  as 
an  ethical  philosophy  which  throws  men  back  upon 
their  own  insight  and  ability — a  sorry  resource  for  a 
convicted  sinner. 


VIEW    OF   IMMORTALITY  95 

Did  Emerson  believe  in  personal  immortality?  It 
is  very  doubtful.  If  God  is  impersonal,  and  man  is  to 
be  merged  at  last  in  God,  the  less  faith  we  have  in 
individual  existence  beyond  the  grave,  the  better.  Yet, 
with  the  mystics,  he  did  not  believe  in  annihilation. 
"  God  upholds  us  with  his  uncreated  power,"  he  says, 
"  and  keeps  the  soul  still  herself."  And  some  of  his 
interpreters,  like  Cooke,  maintain  that  he  rejects  the 
individual,  local,  and  selfish,  but  retains  the  personal, 
divine,  and  eternal.  One  can  find  in  his  writings  oc- 
casional utterances  that  encourage  faith.  "  Life  is  not 
long  enough  for  art,  or  for  friendship,"  he  declares. 
"  The  soul  does  not  age  with  the  body."  He  is  "  sure 
that  in  the  other  life  we  will  be  permitted  to  finish  the 
work  begun  in  this."  But  then  he  also  says :  "  A  future 
state  is  an  illusion  for  the  ever-present  state.  It  is 
not  duration,  but  a  taking  of  the  soul  out  of  time."  He 
believes  in  the  future,  only  because  he  has  God  in  the 
present.  But  whether  we  shall  know  each  other  beyond 
the  grave  is  "  a  school-dame  question."  Even  the 
"  Threnody,"  which  expresses  his  grief  at  the  death 
of  his  beautiful  young  son,  gives  us  no  certain  assur- 
ance that  he  ever  expected  to  meet  him  again.  In  the 
shadow  of  that  affliction  he  wrote  to  Carlyle :  "  I 
dare  not  fathom  the  Invisible  and  Untold,  to  in- 
quire what  relations  to  my  departed  ones  I  yet  sus- 
tain." He  speaks  of  "  the  inarticulateness  of  the 
Supreme  Power,"  and  asks :  "  How  can  we  insatiate 
hearers,  perceivers,  and  thinkers,  ever  reconcile  us  to 
it  ?  My  divine  temple,  which  all  angels  seemed  to  love 
to  build,  was  shattered  in  a  night."  This  is  surely 
far  short  of  the  comfort  which  Christ  gives  to  his  dis- 


96  "  THRENODY  " 

ciples,  and  it  shows  that  in  his  sorrow  our  author 
needed  more  than  any  inner  light  could  give  him.  The 
"  Threnody  "  is  painful  reading  to  one  who  believes 
that  Christ  has  brought  life  and  immortality  to  light  in 
his  glorious  gospel,  and  it  reminds  us  of  the  sad  and 
uncertain  inscriptions  upon  the  monuments  of  the 
dead  in  classic  times.  Listen  to  these  words: 

The  South-wind  brings 

Life,  sunshine  and  desire, 

And  on  every  mount  and  meadow 

Breathes  aromatic  fire; 

But  over  the  dead  he  has  no  power, 

The  lost,  the  lost,  he  cannot  restore; 

And,  looking  over  the  hills,  I  mourn 

The  darling  who  shall  not  return. 


Not  mine, — I  never  called  thee  mine, 

But  Nature's  heir, — if  I  repine, 

And  seeing  rashly  torn  and  moved 

Not  what  I  made,  but  what  I  loved, 

Grow  early  old  with  grief  that  thou 

Must  to  the  wastes  of  Nature  go, — 

'Tis  because  a  general  hope 

Was  quenched,  and  all  must  doubt  and  grope. 


What  is  excellent, 
As  God  lives,  is  permanent; 
Hearts  are  dust,  hearts'  loves  remain; 
Heart's  love  will  meet  thee  again. 
Revere  the  Maker;  fetch  thine  eye 
Up  to  his  style,  and  manners  of  the  sky. 


Silent  rushes  the  swift  Lord 
Through  ruined  systems  still  restored, 
Broadsowing,  bleak  and  void  to  bless, 
Plants  with  worlds  the  wilderness; 


A   LIKENESS    TO   SCHLEIERMACHER  97 

Waters  with  tears  of  ancient  sorrow 
Apples  of  Eden  ripe  to-morrow. 
House  and  tenant  go  to  ground, 
Lost  in  God,  in  Godhead  found. 

Schleiermacher's  touching  address  at  the  funeral  of 
his  only  son  furnishes  a  remarkable  parallel  to  this 
poem.  They  both  exhibit  a  calm  confidence  that  ajl  is 
well,  without  certainty  of  future  reunion.  So  far  as 
Emerson  was  concerned,  Jesus  might  never  have  lived, 
and  might  never  have  opened  the  kingdom  of  heaven 
to  all  believers.  He  would  have  been  content,  he  said, 
"  to  be  a  good  Roman  in  the  days  of  Cicero.  I  burn 
after  the  '  aliquid  immenswn  infinitumque'  which 
Cicero  desired."  Like  Marcus  Aurelius,  he  had  the 
self-repression  and  the  self-assertion  of  the  Stoic. 
Calm  and  benignant,  a  New  England  Brahmin,  living 
in  an  upper  air  of  thought,  he  had  no  eye  for  the 
tragedy  of  the  world  and  for  its  need  of  redemption.. 
He  moved  among  men  with  something  of  Goethe's 
majestic  composure.  Doctor  Holmes  tells  us  that  he 
was  fully  six  feet  in  height,  but  spare  in  build  and 
weighing  only  one  hundred  and  forty  pounds.  Blue 
eyes,  brown  hair,  sloping  shoulders,  all  marked  him 
for  an  idealist.  He  had  no  ear  for  music,  never  in- 
dulged in  loud  laughing,  was  no  mathematician  or 
mechanic.  The  seeing  eye  was  his,  as  he  himself  said, 
but  not  the  working  hand.  He  was  never  hungry, 
though  he  always  had  pie  for  breakfast,  and  only  re- 
plied to  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes's  remonstrance  with 
the  naive  question,  "Why,  what  is  pie  for?"  He 
rose  at  seven,  drank  coffee  and  tea,  and  took  to  his 
bed  at  ten  in  the  evening.  He  complained  of  his 


98  PERSONAL    CHARACTERISTICS 

own  debility,  procrastination,  and  inefficiency;  yet  he 
was  instant  in  season  and  out  of  season  at  his  work 
of  reading,  thinking,  and  writing;  so  that  the  amount 
of  his  literary  product,  though  small  in  poetry,  is  in 
prose  extraordinarily  large. 

Emerson  was  not  only  sincere  in  his  thinking — he 
was  also  honest  in  his  utterances.  The  condensation 
and  pithiness  of  every  sentence  in  his  conversation 
and  in  his  writing  were  the  fruit  of  much  pondering 
of  phrase.  "  To  give  the  thought  just  and  full  expres- 
sion," he  says,  "  I  must  not  prematurely  utter  it.  It  is 
as  if  you  let  the  spring  snap  too  soon."  We  know 
what  is  meant  by  "  going  off  at  half-cock."  There  was 
something  attractive  and  impressive  in  his  frequent 
waiting  for  the  proper  word,  and  in  his  triumphant 
seizure  of  that  word  when  it  came  to  mind.  This 
painstaking,  however,  became  too  much  of  a  habit,  and 
it  led  to  paralysis.  In  his  latter  days  he  was  afflicted 
with  great  loss  of  memory.  First  the  names  of  per- 
sons, and  then  the  names  of  the  most  familiar  things, 
passed  from  him.  But  this  affliction  seemed  never  to 
disturb  his  tranquillity.  He  smiled  at  himself;  took 
the  needed  word  from  others,  went  on  in  perfect  com- 
posure. It  was  affecting  to  see  him  at  the  funeral 
of  Longfellow.  He  paid  respect  by  his  presence  to 
one  of  his  lifelong  friends,  a  poet  like  himself,  and  one 
more  widely  popular.  At  the  close  of  the  service  he 
turned  to  his  companion  and  said :  "  The  gentleman 
whose  funeral  we  have  been  attending  was  a  sweet  and 
beautiful  soul,  but — I  have  forgotten  his  name."  And 
in  less  than  a  twelvemonth  Emerson  had  followed 
Longfellow. 


"  TERMINUS  "  99 

He  was  what  he  was,  and  we  must  value  the  good, 
even  while  we  deprecate  the  evil.  He  grasped  one  of 
the  greatest  truths,  and  that  one  truth  gave  him  a 
resting-place  and  fortress  from  which  he  could  look 
out  calmly  upon  the  world.  As  years  increased,  he 
could  write: 

Spring  still  makes  spring  in  the  mind 

When  sixty  years  are  told; 
Love  wakes  anew  this  throbbing  heart, 

And  we  are  never  old; 
Over  the  winter  glaciers 

I  see  the  summer  glow, 
And  through  the  wild-piled  snow-drift, 

The  warm  rosebuds  below.41 

Good-bye,  proud  world!     I'm  going  home: 
Thou  art  not  my  friend,  and  I'm  not  thine. 
Long  through  thy  weary  crowds  I  roam; 
A  river-ark  on  the  ocean  brine, 
Long  I've  been  tossed  like  the  driven  foam; 
But  now,  proud  world!    I'm  going  home.42 

When  frail  Nature  can  no  more, 
Then  the  Spirit  strikes  the  hour; 
My  servant  Death,  with  solving  rite, 
Pours  finite  into  infinite.13 

And  in  all  literature  there  are  few  anticipations  of 
death  more  composed  and  stalwart  than  Emerson's 
poem  entitled  "  Terminus  "  : 

It  is  time  to  be  old, 
To  take  in  sail: — 
The  god  of  bounds, 
Who  sets  to  seas  a  shore, 
Came  to  me  in  his  fatal  rounds, 
And  said,  'No  more! 

41  "  The  World-Soul"  "  Good-bye."  «  "  Threnody." 


100  A    NON-ETHICAL   MONIST 

No  farther  shoot 

Thy  broad  ambitious  branches,  and  thy  root. 

Fancy  departs:  no  more  invent; 

Contract  thy  firmament 

To  compass  of  a  tent.' 


As  the  bird  trims  her  to  the  gale, 
I  trim  myself  to  the  storm  of  time, 
I  man  the  rudder,  reef  the  sail, 
Obey  the  voice  at  eve  obeyed  at  prime: 
'  Lowly  faithful,  banish  fear, 
Right  onward  drive  unharmed; 
The  port,  well  worth  the  cruise,  is  near, 
And  every  wave  is  charmed.' 

This  is  beautiful  and  impressive;  but  it  gives  no 
ground  for  trust  to  a  sinner.  The  apostle  has  a  better 
hope ;  knows  whom  he  has  believed ;  and  is  persuaded 
that  he  will  keep  that  which  he  has  committed  to  him 
against  the  great  inevitable  day.  Aye,  more  than  this, 
he  has  a  desire  to  depart  and  to  be  with  Christ,  which 
is  far  better. 

Ralph  Waldo  Emerson  was  a  monist.  He  held  that 
there  is  but  one  substance,  ground,  or  principle  of  be- 
ing, namely,  God.  Scripture  asserts  this  doctrine,  when 
it  teaches,  the  divine  omnipresence  and  immanence. 
If  Emerson  had  taught  only  this,  he  might  have  been 
of  unqualified  benefit  to  his  generation.  But  Scripture 
teaches  other  truths  which  qualify  this — I  mean  the 
truth  of  God's  transcendence  and  personality,  and  the 
truth  of  man's  distinct  personality  as  reflecting  the  per- 
sonality of  God.  There  are  two  sorts  of  monism — 
an  ethical  monism  which  recognizes  these  ethical  facts 
in  God  and  in  man,  and  a  non-ethical  monism  which 
ignores  or  denies  them.  It  was  a  non-ethical  monism 


THE   AUTHORITY    OF    NATURAL   IMPULSE          IOI 

to  which  Emerson  held.  Deity  so  absorbed  humanity 
that  there  was  little  roorn.^  left  for  freedom,  or  re- 
sponsibility, or  sin,  or  guilt,  or  atonement,  or  retribu- 
tion. Unitarianism  demonstrated  its  logical  insuffi- 
ciency by  its  lapse  from  ethical  standards.  The  high 
Arianism  of  Channing  degenerated  into  the  half- 
fledged  pantheism  of  Emerson.  While  we  recognize 
the  great  truth  which  Emerson  proclaimed — the  truth 
of  metaphysical  monism,  or  the  doctrine  of  one  sub- 
stance, principle,  or  ground  of  being — we  must  also 
insist  on  the  complementary  truth  which  he  ignored  or 
denied — the  truth  of  psychological  dualism,  or  the  doc- 
trine that  man's  soul  is  personally  distinct  from  matter 
on  the  one  hand,  and  from  God  on  the  other. 

Emerson  did  not  regard  himself  as  a  pantheist.  He 
cared  little  for  names.  He  was  bent  only  upon  seizing 
whatever  truth  there  was  in  pantheism,  while  he  still 
held  to  the  essentials  of  theism.  But  he  was  un- 
consciously influenced  by  naturalistic  prepossessions, 
and  he  did  not  sufficiently  realize  that  nature  must  be 
interpreted  by  man,  and  not  man  by  nature.  The  God 
that  nature  gave  him  was  a  God  devoid  of  moral  at- 
tributes, a  God  who  was  author  of  evil  as  well  as  of 
good,  a  God  who  manifested  himself  only  in  law,  a  God 
who  could  hold  no  personal  intercourse  with  his  crea- 
tures, a  God  incapable  of  revelation  or  redemption. 
Man  is  thrown  back  upon  his  own  powers.  The  only 
God  he  knows  is  in  his  own  soul.  An  exaggerated 
self-appreciation  takes  the  place  of  worship;  natural 
impulse  becomes  the  only  authority;  self-realization  is 
the  only  end.  Thus  a  non-ethical  monism  is  ultimate 
deification  of  self,  and  Emerson  is  "  the  friend  and 


IO2  THE   DRIFT    OF    EMERSON  S    INFLUENCE 

aider  of  those  who  would  live  in  the  spirit,"  not  in  the 
sense  of  leading  them  to  receive  and  obey  the  Spirit  of 
God,  but  by  blinding  them  to  the  truth  and  giving 
them  over  to  the  spirit  of  evil. 

In  his  early  days  Emerson  quoted  with  approbation 
our  Saviour's  words,  "  If  ye  do  my  Father's  will,  ye 
shall  know  of  the  doctrine."  It  was  not  an  exact  quo- 
tation, but  it  had  awakened  a  responsive  emotion  in  his 
heart.  We  are  led  to  wonder  what  Emerson's  in- 
fluence would  have  been,  if  he  had  heeded  that  ad- 
monition and  had  yielded  his  allegiance  to  him  whom 
God  has  sent  to  reveal  and  to  save.  That  matchless 
gift  of  fresh  and  incisive  utterance  might  then  have 
been  used  in  winning  men  to  Christ,  whereas  it  has 
often  drawn  men  away  from  him;  it  might  have  led 
men  through  Christ  to  God,  whereas  it  has  often  held 
before  them  a  vague  abstraction  which  eludes  while  it 
attracts.  The  God  of  the  pantheist  is  no  God  for  the 
ignorant  or  the  sinful  or  the  dying.  In  so  far  as  he 
taught  men  of  a  present  God  in  nature  and  in  history, 
we  can  apply  to  him  the  words  of  Christ,  "  He  that 
is  not  against  us  is  for  us."  But  in  so  far  as  he 
ignored  and  denied  Christ's  deity  and  atonement  and 
authority,  Dr.  William  Hague's  judgment  upon  Em- 
erson must  be  ours — a  judgment  all  the  more  fitting 
because  it  repeats  the  words  of  Christ  himself:  "He 
that  is  not  with  me  is  against  me;  and  he  that  gather- 
eth  not  with  me  scattereth  abroad." 

Emerson  died  on  the  twenty-seventh  day  of  April, 
1882.  Cabot  tells  us,  very  simply  and  beautifully,  that 
on  the  following  Sunday,  April  the  thirtieth,  in  Sleepy 
Hollow,  a  grove  consecrated  as  a  burial-place  on  the 


IN  THE  CATHEDRAL  OF  NATURE        IO3 

edge  of  the  village  of  Concord,  and  at  the  foot  of  a  tall 
pine  tree  upon  the  top  of  the  ridge  in  the  highest  part 
of  the  grounds,  Emerson's  body  was  laid,  not  far  from 
the  graves  of  Hawthorne  and  of  Thoreau,  and  sur- 
rounded by  those  of  his  kindred.  His  mortal  remains 
rest  in  the  Cathedral  of  Nature,  whose  life  he  strove 
to  absorb  and  to  interpret ;  and  since  he  uttered  at  least 
some  truth  of  value  to  his  generation  and  to  the  world, 
we  may  still  say : 

Speak  no  more  of  his  renown, 
Lay  your  earthly  fancies  down, 
And  in  the  vast  cathedral  leave  him, 
God  accept  him,  Christ  receive  him! 


Ill 

JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


OF  all  our  American  poets,  Whittier  is  the  most 
American.  He  is  no  exotic.  Emerson,  Holmes, 
Lowell,  and  even  Bryant,  with  all  their  effort  to  escape 
from  foreign  standards,  were  unconsciously  influenced 
by  classical  or  by  English  literature.  Whittier  was 
rooted  more  deeply  than  they  in  the  New  England  soil, 
drew  his  sustenance  from  men  rather  than  from  books, 
and  bore  genuinely  native  fruits  of  sincerity  and  free- 
dom. Like  Robert  Burns,  who  first  kindled  in  him  the 
ambition  to  be  a  poet,  he  was  too  poor  to  go  to  college. 
But  poverty  and  hardship  gave  him  sympathy  with  all 
sufferers,  and  made  his  verse  the  unsophisticated  ex- 
pression of  common  human  needs  and  aspirations. 
His  religious  nature  recognized  in  all  its  impulses,  not 
so  much  the  Over-Soul  that  thinks,  as  the  Over-Heart 
that  throbs,  in  all  humanity;  and  this  reference  of  the 
inner  light  to  its  personal  divine  source  consecrated 
his  poetry.  If  Burns  was  the  national  lyrist  of  Scot- 
land, then  Whittier  is  the  national  lyrist  of  America. 
His  is  a  homespun  verse,  but  it  is  the  utterance  of  a 
patriot  and  a  prophet,  even  more  truly  than  was  the 
poetry  of  Burns.  It  is  profoundly  and  pervasively  re- 
ligious. His  political  poems  are  half-battles,  because 

107 


IO8  PURITANISM    AND   QUAKERISM 

they  are  half-prayers.  And  the  spirit  of  them  is  that 
which  he  celebrates  in  his  "  Prophecy  of  Samuel 
Sewall  " : 

Praise  and  thanks  for  an  honest  man! — 
Glory  to  God  for  the  Puritan! 

Whittier  was  a  Quaker,  and  Quakerism  was  Puritan- 
ism carried  to  its  logical  extreme.  The  Puritan  had 
renounced  allegiance  to  the  papacy,  and  had  asserted 
his  right  of  immediate  access  to  God,  without  interven- 
tion of  priest  or  sacrament.  But  he  put  Scripture  in 
the  place  of  the  church,  as  the  infallible  rule  of  faith 
and  practice,  and  this  semi-deification  of  external  au- 
thority led  to  deadness  of  feeling.  George  Fox  re- 
volted from  the  formalism  into  which  the  church  had 
sunk.  He  trembled  and  quaked  in  the  felt  presence 
of  the  living  God.  He  found  One,  "  even  Christ 
Jesus,  who  could  speak  to  his  condition."  He  dis- 
covered anew  the  spirituality  of  true  religion,  and 
longed  to  impart  this  discovery  to  others.  He  began 
a  public  ministry,  going  through  England  on  foot  and 
at  his  own  charges,  that  the  people  "  might  receive 
Christ  Jesus." 

This  was  the  beginning  of  Quakerism.  Fox  did  not 
deny  the  authority  of  Scripture,  but  he  put  the  inward 
testimony  of  the  Holy  Spirit  side  by  side  with  Scrip- 
ture as  its  supplement  and  interpreter.  Barclay,  the 
theologian  of  the  sect,  declared  that  "  Whatsoever  any 
do,  pretending  to  the  Spirit,  which  is  contrary  to  the 
Scriptures,  should  be  accounted  and  reckoned  a  de- 
lusion of  the  Devil."  There  were,  however,  even  in 
that  day,  members  of  the  Society  who  so  exaggerated 


WHITTIER   AN    ORTHODOX    QUAKER  KX) 

the  importance  of  their  personal  experience  as  to  make 
the  inner  light  modify  and  even  supersede  the  outward 
and  written  revelation.  The  Hicksite  party  in  America 
was  only  a  recrudescence  of  that  early  tendency.  As 
they  could  deny  the  special  inspiration  of  Scripture, 
they  could  also  substitute  Christ  in  the  heart  for  the 
historic  Christ,  and  the  very  foundations  of  Christian 
faith  gave  way.  John  Greenleaf  Whittier  never  fa- 
vored these  aberrations  of  doctrine.  He  was  to  the 
last  an  Orthodox  Quaker,  holding  the  Scriptures  to  be 
"  a  rule,  not  the  rule  of  faith  and  practice,  which  is 
none  other  than  the  omnipresent  Spirit  of  God — a  sub- 
ordinate, secondary,  and  declaratory  rule — they  testify 
of  Christ  within."  1  And  at  his  eightieth  anniversary 
he  read  the  lines : 

Scotland  shall  flourish  while  each  peasant  learns 
The  psalms  of  David  and  songs  of  Burns. 

The  inner  promptings  of  the  spirit,  independent  of 
book  or  reason,  are  an  uncertain  indication  of  duty, 
and  a  frail  support  in  sorrow.  The  inner  light,  so  far 
as  it  is  trustworthy,  has  its  source  outside  of  itself,  and 
is  to  be  tested  and  corrected  by  God's  external  revela- 
tion. We  are  to  "  try  the  spirits,  whether  they  be  from 
God."  As  all  the  light  of  day  comes  from  the  sun,  so 
all  the  light  of  conscience  comes  from  Christ,  "  the 
Light  that  lighteth  every  man."  And  faith  is  the  eye 
which  receives  his  light  and  purifies  the  light  within. 
Whittier  was  a  believer  in  Christ.  He  also  believed  in 
an  immediate  influence  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  "  Some- 
thing outside  of  myself  speaks  to  me  and  holds  me  to 

1  Letter  to  Richard  Nott,  1840. 


IIO   PROTEST  AGAINST  PURITAN  INTOLERANCE 

duty,  warns,  reproves,  and  approves — a  revelation  of 
God."  So  he  writes.  But  this  mysticism  is  corrected 
by  recognizing  the  inspiration  and  authority  of  Scrip- 
ture, and  the  oneness  of  the  Christ  within  with  the 
historic  Christ  who  suffered  and  died  on  Calvary. 

It  is  no  wonder  that  eccentricities  of  Quaker  doc- 
trine brought  down  upon  many  members  of  the  Society 
the  strong  arm  of  the  law.  When  they  were  moved  to 
interrupt  the  worship  of  the  churches  by  their  de- 
nunciations, and  to  defy  the  authorities  by  parading 
naked  through  the  streets,  the  inner  light  seemed  only 
another  name  for  insanity.  In  England  and  in 
America  alike,  they  were  imprisoned  and  exiled.  Mary 
Dyer  and  three  male  Friends  were  hanged  on  Boston 
Common,  and  female  members  of  the  sect  were 
stripped  to  the  waist,  whipped  unmercifully,  and  driven 
out  into  the  wilderness.  To  shelter  them  was  a  crime. 
Doctor  Ellis  claimed  that  the  Quakers  were  as  much  to 
blame  for  being  hanged  as  the  Puritans  were  for 
hanging  them.  But  Whittier  indignantly  replied  that 
Puritan  intolerance  had  turned  the  heads  of  unoffend- 
ing Christians,  and  had  compelled  them  to  their  strange 
methods  of  testimony: 

"  God  is  our  witness,"  the  victims  cried, 
"  We  suffer  foT  Him  who  for  all  men  died; 
The  wrong  ye  do  has  been  done  before, 
We  bear  the  stripes  that  the  Master  bore!  "2 

The  founder  of  the  Whittier  family  in  New  England 
was  Thomas  Whittier,  who  came  to  this  country  in 
1638.  He  was  not  himself  a  Quaker,  though  he  knew 

J  "  How  the  Women  Went  from  Dover." 


AN    INHERITANCE    OF    BLOOD    AND    PRINCIPLES       III 

of  George  Fox  and  sympathized  with  his  doctrine. 
Haverhill,  thirty  miles  north  of  Boston,  was  then  an 
outpost  of  civilization,  with  a  hundred  miles  of  wilder- 
ness and  roving  bands  of  Indians  beyond  it.  Here, 
in  its  East  Parish,  and  in  a  beautiful  bend  of  the 
Merrimac,  though  out  of  sight  to  any  other  settler, 
Thomas  Whittier  made  his  home  and  reared  a  stal- 
wart family  of  five  sons  and  five  daughters.  His 
grandson  Joseph  married  a  Greenleaf,  of  probably 
Huguenot  descent,  since  the  name  seems  to  be  the 
French  Feuillevert  Anglicized.  Our  poet  was  the 
grandson  of  this  grandson.  His  father  was  a  devout 
member  of  the  Society  of  Friends,  and  his  mother  one 
of  the  loveliest  and  saintliest  of  women.  In  her 
veins  was  the  blood  of  Stephen  Bachiler,  an  English 
Nonconformist  and  an  Oxford  man,  who  had  come  to 
America  to  avoid  persecution.  Bachiler's  daughter 
Susannah  was  the  grandmother  of  Daniel  Webster,  so 
that  John  Greenleaf  Whittier  and  Daniel  Webster  were 
cousins. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  the  Friends  were  men  of 
peace.  They  asked  only  the  privilege  of  worshiping 
God  according  to  the  dictates  of  their  own  consciences. 
It  was  the  same  right  which  the  Puritans  claimed  for 
themselves.  But  the  Puritans  denied  it  to  others,  and 
there  grew  up  in  Massachusetts  an  autocracy  and  a 
hierarchy  as  intolerant  and  cruel  as  that  from  which 
Quakers  and  Huguenots  had  fled  across  the  sea.  Our 
poet  grew  up  in  an  atmosphere  of  intense  indignation 
against  this  intolerance,  while  at  the  same  time  the 
spirit  of  revolt  was  held  in  check  by  the  principles  of 
peace,  and  by  the  faith  that  God  would  in  due  time 


112  QUAKER    LIFE    AND    DOCTRINE 

vindicate  the  right.  On  the  nineteenth  of  October, 
1658,  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  enacted  that 
"  any  person  or  persons  of  the  cursed  sect  of  Quakers  " 
should,  on  conviction  of  the  same,  be  banished,  on  pain 
of  death,  from  the  jurisdiction  of  the  commonwealth. 
On  a  painting  by  Abbey  commemorating  this  decree 
Whittier  wrote  his  poem  entitled  "  Banished  from 
Massachusetts  " : 

The  Muse  of  history  yet  shall  make  amends 

To  those  who  freedom,  peace,  and  justice  taught, 
Beyond  their  dark  age  led  the  van  of  thought, 

And  left  unforfeited  the  name  of  Friends. 

We  must  remember  that  Quakers  called  themselves 
"  Friends,"  not  primarily  because  they  were  friends  to 
one  another  or  to  mankind,  but  because,  like  Abraham, 
they  were  conscious  of  being  the  chosen  friends  of  God, 
and  of  living  in  fellowship  with  him.  In  "  The  Penn- 
sylvania Pilgrim,"  Whittier  has  given  us  a  vivid  de- 
scription of  Quaker  life  and  doctrine : 

Gathered  from  many  sects,  the  Quaker  brought 

His  old  beliefs,  adjusting  to  the  thought 

That  moved  his  soul  the  creed  his  fathers  taught 

One  faith  alone,  so  broad  that  all  mankind 
Within  themselves  its  secret  witness  find, 
The  soul's  communion  with  the  Eternal  Mind, 

The  Spirit's  law,  the  Inward  Rule  and  Guide, 
Scholar  and  peasant,  lord  and  serf,  allied, 
The  polished  Penn  and  Cromwell's  Ironside. 

The  Light  of  Life  shone  round  him;  one  by  one 
The  wandering  lights,  that  all-misleading  run, 
Wenfout  like  candles  paling  in  the  sun. 


QUAKER    HABITS    OF    WHITTIER  113 

That  Light  he  followed,  step  by  step,  where'er 

It  led,  as  in  the  vision  of  the  seer 

The  wheels  moved  as  the  spirit  in  the  clear 

And  terrible  crystal  moved,  with  all  their  eyes 
Watching  the  living  splendor  sink  or  rise, 
Its  will  their  will,  knowing  no  otherwise. 

Within  himself  he  found  the  law  of  right, 
He  walked  by  faith  and  not  the  letter's  sight, 
And  read  his  Bible  by  the  Inward  Light. 

His  was  the  Christian's  unsung  Age  of  Gold, 
A  truer  idyl  than  the  bards  have  told 
Of  Arno's  banks  or  Arcady  of  old. 

Whittier  was  a  birthright  member  of  the  Society. 
He  gloried  in  his  ancestry,  adhered  to  their  sober 
dress,  used  the  "  thee  "  and  "  thou  "  of  their  traditional 
speech.  He  attended  Quaker  meetings,  though  he  sel- 
dom or  never  spoke  in  them;  his  only  criticism  upon 
these  meetings  was  indeed  that  "  there  was  too  much 
speaking  in  them."  He  would  not  by  his  presence 
countenance  the  marriage  of  a  Quaker  to  one  outside 
of  the  Society,  though  he  did  send  a  poem  to  the 
married  pair.  He  was  never  in  a  theater  or  a  circus. 
When  member  of  the  legislature,  he  would  take  no 
oath,  nor  address  the  chair.  He  would  not  wear  crape, 
nor  use  the  ordinary  dates.  He  owned  no  master  but 
the  Lord.  He  hated  priests  and  kings,  and  abhorred 
the  Puritan  theocracy.  But  his  independence  was  quiet 
and  unresisting,  though  his  mother  and  his  aunt  melted 
the  wax  figure  of  a  clergyman  that  his  soul  might  go 
to  its  doom  in  hell.  In  the  days  when  Puseyism  was 
rife,  he  wrote :  "  Has  thee  noticed  the  general  tendency 
toward  the  old  trust  in  man — in  priests  and  sacrifices, 


114  WHITTIER   AND    EMERSON 

in  ghostly  mummery  and  machinery?  To  me  it  seems 
to  bid  fair  to  swallow  up  everything  but  Quakerism  of 
the  old  stamp — rejection  of  all  ceremonial,  total  dis- 
belief in  the  power  of  pope,  priest,  or  elder  to  give  a 
ransom  for  the  soul  of  another." 

The  Quaker  of  the  olden  time! 

How  calm  and  firm  and  true, 
Unspotted  by  its  wrong  and  crime, 

He  walked  the  dark  earth  through. 

He  walked  by  faith  and  not  by  sight, 

By  love  and  not  by  law; 
The  presence  of  the  wrong  or  right 

He  rather  felt  than  saw. 

And,  pausing  not  for  doubtful  choice 

Of  evils  great  or  small, 
He  listened  to  that  inward  voice 

Which  called  away  from  all. 

O  Spirit  of  that  early  day, 

So  pure  and  strong  and  true, 
Be  with  us  in  the  narrow  way 

Our  faithful  fathers  knew. 
Give  strength  the  evil  to  forsake, 

The  cross  of  Truth  to  bear, 
And  love  and  reverent  fear  to  make 

Our  daily  lives  a  prayer.3 

Whittier  was  indeed  a  Quaker  of  the  olden  time. 
The  inner  light  upon  which  he  depended  was  a  very 
different  light  from  that  which  was  recognized  by 
Emerson.  Emerson's  light  was  the  light  of  nature; 
Whittier's  was  the  light  of  Christ.  Emerson  regarded 
the  fixed  successions  of  the  physical  world  as  the 

3  "  The  Quaker  of  the  Olden  Time." 


EARLY    SURROUNDINGS    AND    PRIVATIONS          11$ 

primitive  reality;  Whittier  thought  conscience  and 
heart  of  more  importance  than  all  the  paraphernalia 
of  planets  and  of  suns.  Emerson  was  influenced  by 
the  materialistic  philosophy  of  the  English  deists,  and 
by  the  Unitarian  reaction  from  the  older  Calvinistic 
theology;  Whittier  drew  his  inspiration  and  his  doc- 
trine from  deep  personal  experience  of  sin  and  of  re- 
demption, and  from  sympathetic  observation  of  the 
sorrow  and  guilt  of  humanity.  In  short,  Emerson  be- 
gan with  nature ;  Whittier  began  with  man.  Emerson 
interpreted  man  by  nature ;  Whittier  interpreted  nature 
by  man.  For  this  reason  there  is  a  prevailing  ethical 
element  in  Whittier's  poetry,  which  Emerson's  almost 
wholly  lacks ;  the  keynote  of  Whittier's  is  compassion, 
while  that  of  Emerson  is  speculation;  Emerson's  in- 
tuitions are  the  uncertain  utterances  of  his  own  imper- 
fect moral  being;  Whittier's  inner  light  is  that  of  an 
indwelling  and  personal  God. 

The  poet  was  born  and  not  made.  Yet  his  sur- 
roundings had  much  to  do  with  the  unfolding  of  his 
genius.  The  handsome  Quaker  lad  was  five  feet  ten 
and  a  half  inches  tall  when  he  was  only  fifteen  years 
of  age.  But  life  on  the  Haverhill  farm  was  one  of 
solitude  and  privation.  There  were  no  doors  to  the 
barns,  and  no  flannels  or  overcoats  for  men ;  no  buffalo- 
robes  for  driving,  and  no  fires  in  the  meeting-house. 
The  milking  of  seven  cows  daily,  and  the  threshing  of 
wheat  with  the  flail,  overtaxed  the  boy's  strength,  and 
left  him  a  lifelong  prey  to  heart-disease  and  to  in- 
somnia. It  was  a  rocky  and  swampy  farm.  Exposure 
induced  bronchitis.  'Ill-cooked  food  gave  him  the 
dyspepsia.  Yet  he  learned  to  read  at  home;  and  the 


Il6  REMINISCENCES    OF    CHILDHOOD 

Bible,  "  Pilgrim's  Progress,"  and  a  stray  Waverley 
novel  devoured  in  secret,  wakened  in  him  an  intense 
love  of  literature.  "  I  well  remember,"  he  writes, 
"how,  at  a  very  early  age,  the  solemn  organ-roll  of 
Gray's  '  Elegy '  and  the  lyric  sweep  and  pathos  of 
Cowper's  '  Lament  for  the  Royal  George  '  moved  and 
fascinated  me,  with  a  sense  of  mystery  and  power  felt 
rather  than  understood."  His  first  verses  were  appar- 
ently written  on  the  woodwork  of  his  mother's  loom; 
later  efforts  he  committed  to  a  slate;  and  finally  he 
aspired  to  an  album.  His  reminiscences  of  childhood 
are  peculiarly  touching.  Who  can  mistake  the  truth 
of  his  picture  of  "  The  Barefoot  Boy  "? 

Blessings  on  thee,  little  man, 
Barefoot  boy,  with  cheek  of  tan! 
With  thy  turned-up  pantaloons, 
And  thy  merry  whistled  tunes; 
With  thy  red  lip,  redder  still 
Kissed  by  strawberries  on  the  hill; 
With  the  sunshine  on  thy  face, 
Through  thy  torn  brim's  jaunty  grace; 
From  my  heart  I  give  thee  joy, — 
I  was  once  a  barefoot  boy! 

And  that  same  barefoot  boy  we  see  depicted  as  a 
scholar,  in  his  lines  "  To  My  Old  Schoolmaster  "  : 

I,  the  urchin  unto  whom, 
In  that  smoked  and  dingy  room, 
Where  the  district  gave  thee  rule 
O'er  its  ragged  winter  school, 
Thou  didst  teach  the  mysteries 
Of  those  weary  A  B  C's, — 
Where,  to  fill  the  every  pause 
Of  thy  wise  and  learned  saws, 
Through  the  cracked  and  crazy  wall 


A    NATURAL   EDITOR  II/ 

Came  the  cradle-rock  and  squall, 
And  the  goodman's  voice,  at  strife 
With  his  shrill  and  tipsy  wife. 

It  was  one  of  his  crude  early  poems,  "  The  Exile's 
Departure,"  which  attracted  the  attention  of  William 
Lloyd  Garrison,  and  led  ultimately  to  their  partnership 
in  the  work  of  reform.  Without  Whittier's  knowledge, 
his  sister  had  sent  to  the  "  Free  Press  "  of  Newbury- 
port  the  manuscript  of  that  poem.  Garrison  was  but 
little  older  than  Whittier;  but,  with  larger  knowledge 
of  the  world  and  of  literature,  he  recognized  the 
promise  of  it's  author,  and  made  a  journey  of  fourteen 
miles  to  greet  him.  The  father,  was  besought  to  give 
his  son  an  education,  but  at  first  refused,  upon  the 
ground  that  poetry  would  not  give  him  bread.  His 
scruples  were  overruled  when  the  boy  learned  to  make 
shoes  for  twenty-five  cents  the  pair  and  sold  them  to 
pay  his  schooling.  So  Whittier  had  two  years  in  the 
Haverhill  Academy.  They  were  years  of  wide  read- 
ing and  of  constant  literary  production,  both  in  prose 
and  in  verse.  Most  of  his  early  work  indeed  was 
journalistic.  His  poetry  was  thrown  off  hastily  to  ex- 
press some  fleeting  impulse  or  to  meet  some  public 
need.  Whittier  was  a  natural  editor.  Each  new  event 
was  to  him  a  challenge,  and  he  discussed  it  in  print. 
It  was  soon  apparent  that  he  had  political  insight, 
knowledge  of  motives,  and  power  to  direct  public 
opinion.  In  his  "  Tent  on  the  Beach  "  he  describes 
himself: 

And  one  there  was,  a  dreamer  born, 

Who,  with  a  mission  to  fulfil, 
Had  left  the  Muses'  haunts  to  turn 

The  crank  of  an  opinion-mill, 


Il8  PREMONITIONS    OF    COMING    POWER 

Making  his  rustic  reed  of  song 

A  weapon  in  the  war  with  wrong, 
Yoking  his  fancy  to  the  breaking-plough 
That  beam-deep  turned  the  soil  for  truth  to  spring 
and  grow. 

Too  quiet  seemed  the  man  to  ride 

The  winged  Hippogriff  Reform; 

Was  his  a  voice  from  side  to  side 

To  pierce  the  tumult  of  the  storm? 
A  silent,  shy,  peace-loving  man, 
He  seemed  no  fiery  partisan 
To  hold  his  way  against  the  public  frown, 
The  ban  of  Church  and  State,  the  fierce  mob's 
hounding  down. 

For  while  he  wrought  with  strenuous  will 

The  work  his  hands  had  found  to  do, 
He  heard  the  fitful  music  still 

Of  winds  that  out  of  dreamland  blew. 
The  din  about  him  could  not  drown 
What  the  strange  voices  whispered  down; 
Along  his  task-field  weird  processions  swept, 
The  visionary  pomp  of  stately  phantoms  stepped. 

He  had  not  yet  found  himself.  But  vague  premoni- 
tions of  coming  power  and  reputation  were  there  to 
tempt  and  to  attract.  In  "  Moll  Pitcher  "  there  was 
originally  a  closing  stanza,  which  the  poet  subse- 
quently suppressed : 

Land  of  my  fathers! — if  my  name, 
Now  humble  and  unwed  to  fame, 
Hereafter  burn  upon  the  lip 

As  one  of  those  which  may  not  die, 
Linked  in  eternal  fellowship 

With  visions  pure  and  strong  and  high — 
If  the  wild  dreams,  which  quicken  now 
The  throbbing  pulse  of  heart  and  brow, 
Hereafter  take  a  real  form 


THE   ANTI-SLAVERY    AGITATION  119 

Like  specters  changed  to  being  warm; 
And  over  temples  worn  and  gray 

The  starlike  crown  of  glory  shine, — 
Thine  be  the  bard's  undying  lay, 

The  murmur  of  his  praise  be  thine! 

And  now  we  come  to  the  turning-point  of  Whittier's 
life,  to  what  we  must  regard  as  a  genuine  conversion. 
Hitherto  he  had  lived  with  no  definite  aim  beyond  his 
own  development  and  success.  Local  incidents  and 
legends  had  furnished  subjects  for  his  poems.  Political 
advancement  had  seemed  possible,  and  he  had  thought 
seriously  of  running  for  Congress.  He  was  a  brilliant 
editor,  and  he  had  formed  literary  acquaintances  of 
value.  He  longed  to  escape  from  the  monotony  of 
farm  life,  and  to  make  himself  felt  in  public  affairs. 
Then  came  the  anti-slavery  agitation  and  the  call  of 
God  to  espouse  the  cause  of  freedom.  Garrison  sum- 
moned him  to  join  the  abolitionists.  It  was  like  joining 
the  anarchists  of  to-day.  We  must  remember  that 
cotton-growing  at  the  South  had  made  slave-labor 
profitable  and  apparently  necessary.  Northern  capital 
was  invested  in  commerce  and  manufactures  which  de- 
pended on  Southern  trade.  The  early  acknowledgment 
of  the  injustice  of  slavery  was  replaced  by  a  defense  of 
the  system.  Even  the  Quakers  were  sometimes  un- 
willing to  permit  anti-slavery  discussion  in  their  con- 
ferences. The  whole  weight  of  social,  literary,  and 
political  influence  was  on  the  side  of  the  oppressor.  To 
be  an  abolitionist  was  to  expose  oneself  to  contempt 
and  ostracism,  if  not  to  the  violence  of  the  mob. 
When  Garrison  sent  his  ringing  appeal  to  Whittier, 
acceptance  of  his  invitation  meant  for  our  poet  the 


I2O  WHITTIER   ALIGNED    WITH    GARRISON 

giving  up  of  all  his  earthly  prospects  and  consigning 
himself  to  lifelong  poverty  and  disgrace.  The  lines 
which  he  addressed  to  Charles  Sumner  apply  quite  as 
well  to  himself: 

God  said:  "  Break  thou  these  yokes!  undo 

These  heavy  burdens!     I  ordain 
A  work  to  last  thy  whole  life  through, 

A  ministry  of  strife  and  pain. 

"  Forego  thy  dreams-  of  lettered  ease, 
Put  thou  the  scholar's  promise  by, 

The  rights  of  man  are  more  than  these." 
He  heard  and  answered:  "  Here-  am  I!  " 

Garrison's  declaration  of  principles  in  the  first  num- 
ber of  "  The  Liberator  "  was  as  bold  as  the  "  Theses  " 
which  Luther  nailed  to  the  door  of  the  church  in  Wit- 
tenberg :  "  Unconditional  emancipation  is  the  immedi- 
ate duty  of  the  master,  and  the  immediate  right  of  the 
slave.  . .  I  will  be  as  harsh  as  truth,  as  uncompromising 
as  justice;  I  am  in  earnest,  I  will  not  equivocate,  I 
will  not  excuse,  I  will  not  retreat  a  single  inch,  and  I 
will  be  heard."  And  Whittier  responded  to  Garrison's 
appeal : 

My  heart  hath  leaped  to  answer  thine, 

And  echo  back  thy  words, 
As  leaps  the  warrior's  at  the  shine 

And  flash  of  kindred  swords! 

It  was  no  mere  burst  of  youthful*  enthusiasm,  but  a 
heroic  consecration  to  duty.  For  the  thirtieth  anniver- 
sary of  the  Anti-slavery  Society  he  wrote :  "I  am 
thankful  to  divine  Providence  that  turned  me  so  early 
away  from  what  Roger  Williams  calls  '  the  world's 
great  Trinity — pleasure,  profit,  and  honor,' — to  take 


"  EXPOSTULATION  "  12 1 

side  with  the  poor  and  oppressed.  I  am  not  insensible 
to  literary  reputation;  I  love,  perhaps  too  well,  the 
praise  and  good  will  of  my  fellow  men;  but  I  set  a 
higher  value  to  my  name  as  appended  to  the  Anti- 
slavery  Declaration  of  1833,  than  on  the  title-page  of 
any  book."  And  to  a  boy  seeking  counsel  in  after 
years  he  said :  "  My  lad,  if  thou  wouldst  win  success, 
join  thyself  to  some  unpopular  but  noble  cause." 

This  enlistment  of  Whittier  was  immediately  fol- 
lowed by  service.  He  printed  at  his  own  charges  a 
pamphlet  entitled  "  Justice  and  Expediency,"  in  which 
the  whole  question  of  slavery  was  calmly  and  learnedly 
considered.  Then  too  began  that  long  succession  of 
fiery  and  thrilling  appeals  to  the  conscience  and  heart 
of  the  North,  which  made  him,  more  than  all  other 
poets  combined,  a  representative  of  freedom  and  a 
power  to  nerve  our  people  to  defend  the  Union  in  its 
struggle  with  the  slaveholding  aristocracy: 

Our  fellow-countrymen  in  chains! 

Slaves,  in  a  land  of  light  and  law! 
Slaves,  crouching  on  the  very  plains 

Where  rolled  the  storm  of  Freedom's  war! 

What  ho!  our  countrymen  in  chains! 

The  whip  on  woman's  shrinking  flesh! 
Our  soil  yet  reddening  with  the  stains 

Caught  from  her  scourging,  warm  and  fresh! 
What!  mothers  from  their  children  riven! 

What!  God's  own  image  bought  and  sold! 
Americans  to  market  driven, 

And  bartered  as  the  brute  for  gold! 

So  read  his  poem,  "  Expostulation."  He  paid  the 
penalty.  Poetry  in  those  days  was  no  selling  com- 


122  THE    BURDEN    OF   A    PROPHETS    POWER 

modity.  With  his  mother  and  sister  he  lived  on  little 
more  than  five  hundred  dollars  a  year — the  salary  of 
his  editorship.  He  gave  up  all  thought  of  marriage, 
though  there  is  abundant  evidence  that  he  longed  for 
wedded  companionship.  Ill  health  shut  him  out  from 
public  gatherings  and  from  regular  city  life.  When  he 
did  venture  into  the  field,  it  was  to  visit  Garrison  in 
the  Philadelphia  jail  where  he  was  confined  for  calling 
a  slave-dealer  a  pirate,  or  to  see  that  same  Garrison 
dragged  through  the  streets  of  Boston  with  a  rope 
around  his  neck.  The  mob  broke  the  windows  of  the 
Haverhill  church,  where  Whittier  attended  an  anti- 
slavery  meeting,  and  he  was  pelted  with  stones  and 
rotten  eggs  in  Concord.  But  he  says  well : 

The  burden  of  a  prophet's  power 
Fell  on  me  in  that  fearful  hour.* 

Forsaking  poetry  for  humanity,  he  made  both  poetry 
and  humanity  his  own.  Now  first  his  art  became  cos- 
mopolitan and  commanding.  Losing  his  life  for 
Christ's  sake,  he  found  it. 

At  the  age  of  twenty-five  Whittier  was  called  "  a 
gay  young  Quaker,"  though  he  had  "  kept  his  inno- 
cency."  His  gaiety  was  the  expression  of  a  sensi- 
tive and  kindly  nature.  But  it  was  accompanied  by  a 
deep  indignation  against  impurity  and  wrong-doing. 
"  Quaker?  "  was  the  reply  to  one  who  pointed  him  out; 
"  he  will  fight !  "  He  certainly  had  fighting  blood  in 
his  veins,  and  he  explained  this  by  his  inheritance  from 
a  Norman  ancestry.  Gail  Hamilton  worked  for  him 

«  "  Ezekiel." 


A    FIGHTING    SPIRIT    BUT    A    NON-RESISTANT      123 

a  pair  of  slippers  with  the  effigy  of  an  eagle  whose 
claws  grasped  thunderbolts.  Whittier  told  her  that 
she  was  as  sharp  with  her  needle  as  she  was  with  her 
pen.  When  it  came  to  the  question  of  our  dealings  with 
slavery,  it  was  hard  for  him  to  repress  his  belligerent 
instincts.  Yet  his  peace  principles  made  him  a  non- 
resistant.  He  admired  John  Brown,  but  he  disap- 
proved of  his  methods.  He  refused  to  accept  a  pike 
which  was  sent  him  as  a  memento  of  John  Brown's 
raid,  saying,  "  It  is  not  a  Christian  weapon :  it  looks 
too  much  like  murder."  Though  his  poetry  had  done 
much  to  infuse  the  fighting  spirit  into  others,  he  would 
have  let  the  Southern  States  go,  rather  than  subdue 
them  by  force  of  arms.  He  would  have  paid  slave- 
holders for  their  slaves,  but  he  scorned  to  catch  their 
fugitives.  When  our  Civil  War  broke  out,  he  looked 
on  in  sorrow,  and  waited  for  God  to  determine  the 
result.  Yet  his  sympathies  were  all  with  our  Union 
army,  and  he  could  not  hide  from  himself  the  convic- 
tion that  in  some  great  crises  of  history  war  is  inevit- 
able. His  poem  entitled  "  Italy,"  indeed,  makes  it 
plain  that  war  is  sometimes  God's  messenger: 

I  know  the  pent  fire  heaves  its  crust, 
That  sultry  skies  the  bolt  will  form 

To  smite  them  clear;  that  Nature  must 

The  balance  of  her  powers  adjust, 
Though  with  the  earthquake  and  the  storm. 

God  reigns,  and  let  the  earth  rejoice! 

I  bow  before  His  sterner  plan. 
Dumb  are  the  organs  of  my  choice; 
He  speaks  in  battle's  stormy  voice, 

His  praise  is  in  the  wrath  of  man! 


124      WHITTIERS   DIFFERENCES    WITH    GARRISON 

Whittier  was  more  sane  and  practical  than  Garrison. 
He  was  more  unselfish,  and  he  had  more  of  tact  and 
skill.  Garrison  was  dictatorial,  and  unwilling  to  take 
any  subordinate  position.  Whittier  was  willing  to 
humble  himself  for  the  sake  of  the  cause.  Was  the 
Bible  against  anti-slavery?  then  Garrison  declared  the 
Bible  to  be  wrong;  did  the  church  oppose?  then  the 
church  must  be  reformed ;  did  the  Constitution  forbid  ? 
then  the  Constitution  must  be  destroyed;  was  the 
Union  impossible  with  slavery  abolished?  then  death 
to  the  Union !  Garrison  called  the  Constitution  "  a 
covenant  with  death,  and  an  agreement  with  hell," 
and  he  demanded  that  it  be  immediately  annulled.  He 
would  not  vote,  and  he  renounced  all  allegiance  to 
a  government  which  was  in  league  with  slavery. 
Whittier,  on  the  other  hand,  yielded  in  smaller  mat- 
ters, that  he  might  win  in  the  greater.  He  remained 
a  voting  Quaker.  So  there  ensued  a  division  between 
these  friends,  which  lasted  for  years  and  which  greatly 
intensified  Whittier's  loneliness  and  suffering.  Yet 
reconciliation  came  at  last,  and  each  respected  the 
independence  of  the  other.  Each  had  struck  his  honest 
blow,  and  slavery  was  no  more.  Whittier  nobly  com- 
memorates Garrison's  service  in  the  verses  written 
after  his  death: 

The  storm  and  peril  overpast, 
The  hounding  hatred  shamed  and  still, 

Go,  soul  of  freedom!  take  at  last 
The  place  which  thou  alone  canst  fill. 

Confirm  the  lesson  taught  of  old— 
Life  saved  for  self  is  lost,  while  they 

Who  lose  it  in  His  service  hold 
The  lease  of  God's  eternal  day. 


ICHABOD  125 

"Forget,  forgive,  and  unite,"  were  the  words  of 
wisdom  written  by  our  poet  to  the  meeting  held  by 
his  fellow  townsmen  to  consider  the  outrage  done  to 
Charles  Sumner  in  the  Senate  Chamber  of  the  United 
States.  That  advice  represents  the  spirit  of  Whittier's 
life.  Garrison  held  that  "  it  is  a  waste  of  politeness  to 
be  courteous  to  the  Devil."  Whittier  would,  by  fair 
means,  make  even  the  Evil  One  to  serve  the  cause  of 
righteousness.  He  was  a  good  politician,  and  an 
expert  lobbyist.  His  influence  was  both  courted  and 
feared,  for  he  could  not  only  warn  but  rebuke.  Caleb 
Gushing  met  defeat  when  he  failed  to  take  Whittier's 
advice  and  resist  the  aggressions  of  slavery.  And  in 
all  literature  there  is  no  more  scathing  fulmination 
than  his  "  Ichabod,"  when  Daniel  Webster  turned  his 
back  upon  his  patriotic  past  and  strove  to  curry  favor 
with  the  South  by  crowding  upon  the  North  the  in- 
famous Fugitive  Slave  Law : 

So  fallen!  so  lost!  the  light  withdrawn 

Which  once  he  wore! 
The  glory  from  his  gray  hairs  gone 

Forevermore! 

Revile  him  not,  the  Tempter  hath 

A  snare  for  all.; 
And  pitying  tears,  not  scorn  and  wrath, 

B.efit  his  fall! 

Oh,  dumb  be  passion's  stormy  rage, 

When  he  who  might 
Have  lighted  up  and  led  his  age 

Falls  back  in  night. 

Scorn!  would  the  angels  laugh   to  mark 

A  bright  soul  driven, 
Fiend-goaded,  down  the  endless  dark, 

From  hope  and  heaven! 


126  "  THE  LOST   OCCASION  " 

Let  not  the  land  once  proud  of  him 

Insult  him  now, 
Nor  brand  with  deeper  shame  his  dim, 

Dishonored  brow. 

But  let  its  humbled  sons,  instead, 

From  sea  to  lake, 
A  long  lament,  as  for  the  dead, 

In  sadness  make. 

Of  all  we  loved  and  honored,  naught 

Save  power  remains; 
A  fallen  angel's  pride  of  thought, 

Still  strong  in  chains. 

All  else  is  gone;  from  those  great  eyes 

The  soul  has  fled: 
When  faith  is  lost,  when  honor  dies, 

The  man  is  dead! 

Then,  pay  the  reverence  of  old  days 

To  his  dead  fame; 
Walk  backward,  with  averted  gaze, 

And  hide  the  shame! 

But  when  the  great  man  strove  to  drown  remorse  in 
deep  potations,  lost  his  hold  upon  the  country  and 
upon  himself,  and  died  despondent,  Whittier's  heart 
went  out  toward  him  in  compassion,  and  he  wrote 
"  The  Lost  Occasion  " : 

Some  die  too  late  and  some  too  soon, 
At  early  morning,  heat  of  noon, 
Or  the  chill  of  evening  twilight.    Thou, 
Whom  the  rich  heavens  did  so  endow 
With  eyes  of  power  and  Jove's  own  brow, 
With  all  the  massive  strength  that  fills 
Thy  home-horizon's  granite  hills, 


EARLY    FAULTS    OF    WHITTIER's   VERSE  1 27 

Thou,  foiled  in  aim  and  hope,  bereaved 

Of  old  friends,  by  the  new  deceived, 

Too  soon  for  us,  too  soon  for  thee, 

Beside  thy  lonely  Northern  sea, 

Where  long  and  low  the  marsh-lands  spread, 

Laid  wearily  down  thy  august  head. 

Thou  shouldst  have  lived  to  feel  below 
Thy  feet  Disunion's  fierce  upthrow; 
The  late-sprung  mine  that  underlaid 
Thy  sad  concessions  vainly  made. 


No  stronger  voice  than  thine  had  then 
Called  out  the  utmost  might  of  men, 
To  make  the  Union's  charter  free 
And  strengthen  law  by  liberty. 


Ah,  cruel  fate,  that  closed  to  thee 
The  gates  of  opportunity! 


Poe  and  Lanier  devoted  themselves  to  the  mecha- 
nism of  verse.  Art  did  more  for  them  than  nature. 
Whittier  thought  more  of  substance  than  of  form. 
He  had  many  defects  of  ear  and  of  training.  His 
hearing  was  imperfect,  and  he  was  color-blind.  His 
early  poems  were  little  more  than  jingling  common- 
place. He  became  conscious  of  their  imperfections. 
He  said  facetiously  that  he  would  like  to  drown  many 
of  them  like  so  many  unlikely  kittens,  and  as  for 
"  Mogg  Megone,"  he  would  like  to  kill  him  over  again, 
for  he  now  suggested  to  him  "  a  big  Indian  in  his 
war-paint,  strutting  about  in  Sir  Walter  Scott's  plaid." 
This  judgment  was  very  just.  Stedman  says  well  that 
only  what  was  written  after  the  year  1860  has  won  a 


128  WHITTIER'S  FINANCIAL  SUCCESS 

national  reputation.  Before  that  time  his  writing  was 
hasty  and  aimed  at  immediate  effect.  Faults  of  rhyme 
were  frequent  and  glaring.  But  practice  and  reading 
proved  to  be  an  education.  After  the  stress  of  anti- 
slavery  agitation  was  over,  he  became  connected  with 
the  "  Atlantic  Monthly,"  and  accepted  the  criticisms  of 
its  editors.  "  I  hope,"  he  writes  to  them,  "  I  am  cor- 
recting a  little  of  the  bad  grammar  and  rhythmical 
blunders  which  have  so  long  annoyed  Harvard  gradu- 
ates." And  the  quality  of  his  verse  greatly  improved 
in  his  later  years.  Its  simplicity  and  intensity  com- 
mended it  to  common  people.  "  Snow-Bound  "  and 
"  The  Tent  on  the  Beach  "  were  accepted  by  thousands 
as  the  most  characteristic  poems  that  our  country  had 
yet  produced.  And  from  the  time  of  their  publica- 
tion Whittier  was  free  from  financial  care.  "  Snow- 
Bound  "  gave  him  ten  thousand  dollars  for  its  first 
edition.  Of  "  The  Tent  on  the  Beach  "  twenty  thou- 
sand copies  were  sold.  The  poet  could  not  understand 
his  own  success.  "  The  swindle  is  awful,"  he  writes ; 
"  Barnum  is  a  saint  to  me.  I  am  bowed  down  with  a 
sense  of  guilt,  ashamed  to  look  an  honest  man  in  the 
face."  But  the  "  Proem,"  which  he  wrote  to  introduce 
the  first  general  collection  of  his  poems,  expresses  more 
seriously  and  faultlessly  the  feeling  with  which  he 
welcomed  the  first  signs  of  public  favor  and  the  first 
evidence  that  his  work  had  real  value : 

I  love  the  old  melodious  lays 
Which  softly  melt  the  ages  through, 

The  songs  of  Spenser's  golden  days, 

Arcadian  Sidney's  silvery  phrase, 
Sprinkling  our  noon  of  time  with  freshest 

morning  dew. 


ACKNOWLEDGMENT    OF    PUBLIC    ESTEEM          129 

Yet,  vainly  in  my  quiet  hours 
To  breathe  their  marvelous  notes  I  try; 

I  feel  them,  as  the  leaves  and  flowers 

In  silence  feel  the  dewy  showers, 
And  drink  with  glad,  still  lips  the  blessing  of 

the  sky. 

Ihe  rigor  of  a  frozen  clime, 
The  harshness  of  an  untaught  ear, 

The  jarring  words  of  one  whose  rhyme 

Beat  often  Labor's  hurried  time, 
Or=  Duty's  rugged  march  through  storm  and 

strife,  are  here. 

Yet  here  at  least  an  earnest  sense 
Of  human  right  and  weal  is  shown; 

A  hate  of  tyranny  intense, 

And  hearty  in  its  vehemence, 
As  if  rny  brother's  pain  and  sorrow  were  my  own. 

O  Freedom!  if  to  me  belong 
Nor  mighty  Milton's  gift  divine, 

Nor  Marvell's  wit  and  graceful  song, 

Still  with  a  love  as  deep  and  strong 
As  theirs,  I  lay,  like  them,  my  best  gifts  on 

thy  shrine! 

"  Upon  the  occasion  of  my  seventieth  birthday,  in 
1877,"  he  writes : 

I  was  the  recipient  of  many  tokens  of  esteem.  The  pub- 
lishers of  the  "  Atlantic  Monthly  "  gave  a  dinner  in  my  name, 
and  the  editor  of  "  The  Literary  World "  gathered  in  his 
paper  many  affectionate  messages  from  rny  associates  in 
literature  and  the  cause  of  human  progress.  The  lines  which 
follow  were  written  in  acknowledgment. 

Beside  that  milestone  where  the  level  sun, 

Nigh  unto  setting,  sheds  his  last,  low  rays 
On  word  and  work  irrevocably  done, 
Life's  blending  threads  of  good  and  ill  outspun, 

I  hear,  O  friends!  your  words  of  cheer  and  praise, 


I3O  FAITH    IN    EVANGELICAL   TRUTH 

Half  doubtful  if  myself  or  otherwise. 

Like  him  who,  in  the  old  Arabian  joke, 
A  beggar  slept  and  crowned  Caliph  woke. 
Thanks  not  the  less.    With  not  unglad  surprise 
I  see  my  life-work  through  your  partial  eyes; 
Assured,  in  giving  to  my  home-taught  songs 
A  higher  value  than  of  right  belongs, 
You  do  but  read  between  the  written  lines 
The  finer  grace  of  unfulfilled  designs. 


II 


Religion  is  the  foundation  of  theology,  and,  with- 
out heart,  intellect  will  go  astray.  Whittier  was  a 
deeply  religious  man.  His  poetry  had  always  a  re- 
ligious motive.  But  the  religious  element  in  it  does 
not  always  take  doctrinal  form ;  to  discover  it  we  must 
sometimes  look  beneath  the  surface.  It  is  well  that  we 
have  his  prose  to  interpret  his  poetry.  His  "  Life  and 
Letters,"  edited  by  Samuel  T.  Picard,  furnishes  an  ad- 
mirable commentary  upon  his  verse,  and  enables  us  to 
a  large  extent  to  understand  his  theological  views. 
It  must  not  be  expected  that  a  member  of  the  Society 
of  Friends  will  give  us  elaborated  dogmas — that  would 
contravene  the  traditions  of  a  sect  which  makes  little 
of  form,  but  much  of  the  spirit.  But  we  can  find  in 
Whittier's  poems,  as  interpreted  by  his  letters,  an  un- 
mistakable faith  in  evangelical  truth,  and  the  deter- 
mination to  witness  for  that  truth  in  his  writing  and 
in  his  life.  The  breadth  and  sincerity  of  his  faith  is 
proved  by  the  fact  that  his  hymns  are  sung  in  public 
worship  by  all  bodies  of  Christians,  while  they  are 
cherished  by  many  thousands  as  sources  of  private 


A    MAN    OF   THE    ONE    BOOK  13! 

cheer  and  consolation.  No  modern  poet  has  done 
more  to  comfort  the  sorrowing,  or  to  calm  the  passions 
of  our  restless  age.  Whittier  can  do  this,  because 
the  peace  of  God  is  in  his  own  heart. 

He  was  a  man  of  one  book,  and  that  one  book 
was  the  Bible.  When  Edmund  Gosse  visited  him,  he 
was  struck  by  the  meagerness  of  Whittier's  library. 
But  he  knew  the  Scriptures  by  heart.  They  were  not 
to  him  the  sole  authority  in  Christian  faith,  for  they 
needed  to  be  interpreted  by  the  Spirit.  But  when  hu- 
man reason  failed,  Scripture  was  his  guide,  and  fal- 
lible impulses  were  corrected  by  its  superior  wisdom. 
He  writes  of  "  The  Book  "  : 

Gallery  of  sacred  pictures  manifold, 
A  minster  rich  in  holy  effigies, 
And  bearing  on  entablature  and  frieze 

The  hieroglyphic  oracles  of  old. 

Along  its  transept  aureoled  martyrs  sit; 

And  the  low  chancel  side-lights  half  acquaint 
The  eye  with  shrines  of  prophet,  bard,  and  saint, 

Their  age-dimmed  tablets  traced  in  doubtful  writ! 

But  only  when  on  form  and  word  obscure 
Falls  from  above  the  white  supernal  light 
We  read  the  mystic  characters  aright, 

And  life  informs  the  silent  portraiture, 

Until  we  pause  at  last,  awe-held,  before 

The  One  ineffable  Face,  love,  wonder,  and  adore. 

And  in  his  poem  "  The  Word  "  he  describes  the  inner 
voice,  without  which  all  external  revelation  becomes 
as  unintelligible  as  the  hieroglyphics  of  Egypt : 

Voice  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  making  known 

Man  to  himself,  a  witness  swift  and  sure, 
Warning,  approving,  true  and  wise  and  pure, 

Counsel  and  guidance  that  misleadeth  none! 


132         BELIEF  IN  A  PERSONAL  GOD 

By  thee  the  mystery  of  life  is  read; 

The  picture-writing  of  the  world's  gray  seers, 
The  myths  and  parables  of  the  primal  years, 

Whose  letter  kills,  by  thee  interpreted 

Take  healthful  meanings  fitted  to  our  needs, 
And  in  the  soul's  vernacular  express 
The  common  law  of  simple  righteousness. 

Hatred  of  cant  and  doubt  of  human  creeds 

May  well  be  felt:  the  unpardonable  sin 

Is  to  deny  the  Word  of  God  within! 

The  God  in  whose  revelation  he  believed  is  a  per- 
sonal God.  It  might  almost  seem  as  if  he  had  Emer- 
son in  mind  when,  in  his  "  Questions  of  Life,"  he 
wrote : 

In  vain  to  me  the  Sphinx  propounds 
The  riddle  of  her  sights  and  sounds; 
Back  still  the  vaulted  mystery  gives 
The  echoed  question  it  receives. 

I  turn  from  Fancy's  cloud-built  scheme, 
Dark  creed,  and  mournful  eastern  dream 
Of  power,  impersonal  and  cold, 
Controlling  all,  itself  controlled, 
Maker  and  slave  of  iron  laws, 
Alike  the  subject  and  the  cause; 
From  vain  philosophies,  that  try 
The  sevenfold  gates  of  mystery, 
And,  baffled  ever,  babble  still, 
Word-prodigal  of  fate  and  will; 
From  Nature,  and  her  mockery,  Art, 
And  book  and  speech  of  men  apart, 
To  the  still  witness  in  my  heart; 
With  reverence  waiting  to  behold 
His  Avatar  of  love  untold, 
The  Eternal  Beauty  new  and  old! 

Nature  to  him  is  no  blind  guide.     Winnepiseogee  is 
"  the  mirror  of  God's  love  "  : 


NATURES    TESTIMONY    TO    GOD  133 

Touched  by  a  light  that  hath  no  name, 

Are  God's  great  pictures  hung.5 

So  seemed  it  when  yon  hill's  red  crown, 

Of  old,  the  Indian  trod, 
And,  through  the  sunset  air,  looked  down 

Upon  the  Smile  of  God. 
To  him  of  light  and  shade  the  laws 

No  forest  skeptic  taught; 
Their  living  and  eternal  Cause 

His  truer  instinct  sought. 

Thanks,  O  our  Father!  that,  like  him, 

Thy  tender  love  I  see, 
In  radiant  hill  and  woodland  dim, 

And  tinted  sunset  sea. 
For  not  in  mockery  dost  Thou  fill 

Our  earth  with  light  and  grace; 
Thou  hid'st  no  dark  and  cruel  will 

Behind  thy  smiling  face.9 

The  Night  is  mother  of  the  Day, 

The  Winter  of  the  Spring, 
And  ever  upon  old  Decay 

The  greenest  mosses  cling. 
Behind  the  cloud  the  starlight  lurks, 

Through  showers  the  sunbeams  fall; 
For  God,  who  loveth  all  His  works, 

Hath  left  His  hope  with  all!7 

The  harp  at  Nature's  advent  strung 

Has  never  ceased  to  play; 
The  song  the  stars  of  morning  sung 

Has  never  died  away. 

So  Nature  keeps  the  reverent  frame 

With  which  her  years  began, 
And  all  her  signs  and  voices  shame 

The  prayerless  heart  of  man.8 

5  "  Sunset  on  the  Bearcamp."  6  "  The  Lakeside." 

'  "  A  Dream  of  Summer,"  8  "  The  Worship  of  Nature." 


134  GOD'S  JUSTICE  DISCIPLINARY 

Whittier's  anti-slavery  poems  show  that  he  be- 
lieved in  a  God  of  justice,  who  makes  suffering  to 
follow  upon  sin.  "  Ein  Feste  Burg  1st  Unser  Gott " 
is  a  hymn  worthy  to  be  compared  with  that  of  Luther : 

We  wait  beneath  the  furnace-blast 

The  pangs  of  transformation; 
Not  painlessly  doth  God  recast 
And  mould  anew  the  nation. 
Hot  burns  the  fire 
Where  wrongs  expire; 
Nor  spares  the  hand 
That  from  the  land 
Uproots  the  ancient  evil. 

But  he  believed  that  God's  justice  is  one  with  his  love, 
and  that  penalty  is  always  disciplinary  and  remedial. 
In  "  Barclay  of  Ury  "  he  writes : 

Not  in  vain,  Confessor  old, 
Unto  us  the  tale  is  told 

Of  thy  day  of  trial; 
Every  age  on  him  who  strays 
From  its  broad  and  beaten  ways 

Pours  its  seven-fold  vial. 

Happy  he  whose  inward  ear 
Angel  comfortings  can  hear, 

O'er  the  rabble's  laughter; 
And  while  Hatred's  fagots  burn, 
Glimpses  through  the  smoke  discern 

Of  the  good  hereafter. 

The  dread  Ineffable  Glory 

Was  Infinite  Goodness  alone.9 

"  Among  the  Hills  "  gives  a  noble  picture  of  the 
true  relation  between  the  two  great  attributes  of  God  : 

1  "  The  Minister's  Daughter." 


DIVINE   JUSTICE   ONE   WITH   LOVE  135 

Let  Justice  hold  her  scale,  and  Truth  divide 
Between  the  right  and  wrong;  but  give  the  heart 
The  freedom  of  its  fair  inheritance; 


Give  human  nature  reverence  for  the  sake 

Of  One  who  bore  it,  making  it  divine 

With  the  ineffable  tenderness  of  God; 

Let  common  need,  the  brotherhood  of  prayer, 

The  heirship  of  an  unknown  destiny, 

The  unsolved  mystery  round  about  us,  make 

A  man  more  precious  than  the  gold  of  Ophir. 

Sacred,  inviolate,  unto  whom  all  things 

Should  minister,  as  outward  types  and  signs 

Of  the  eternal  beauty  which  fulfils 

The  one  great  purpose  of  creation,  Love, 

The  sole  necessity  of  Earth  and  Heaven! 

Proving  in  a  world  of  bliss 
What  we  fondly  dream  in  this, — 
Love  is  one  with  holiness!10 

Rejoice  in  hope!    The  day  and  night 

Are  one  with  God,  and  one  with  them 
Who  see  by  faith  the  cloudy  hem 

Of  Judgment  fringed  with  Mercy's  light! u 

"  At  Eventide  "  sums  up  the  blessings  of  the  past,  and 
chief, 

The  kind  restraining  hand  of  Providence, 
The  inward  witness,  the  assuring  sense 
Of  an  Eternal  Good  which  overlies 
The  sorrow  of  the  world,  Love  which  outlives 
All  sin  and  wrong,  Compassion  which  forgives 
To  the  uttermost,  and  Justice  whose  clear  eyes 
Through  lapse  and  failure  look  to  the  intent, 
And  judge  our  frailty  by  the  life  we  meant. 


"  In  Memory." 

"  Astraea  at  the  Capitol.' 


136     THE   TEST   OF   THEOLOGY   THE   VIEW    OF   SIN 

"  My  Trust "  illustrates  God's  dealing  with  our  errors 
and  sins,  by  the  kind  restraint  with  which  a  mother 
trains  her  child : 

A  picture  memory  brings  to  me: 
I  look  across  the  years  and  see 
Myself  beside  my  mother's  knee. 


I  wait,  in  His  good  time  to  see 
That  as  my  mother  dealt  with  me 
So  with  His  children  dealeth  He. 


I  suffer  with  no  vain  pretence 
Of  triumph  over  flesh  and  sense, 
Yet  trust  the  grievous  providence, 

How'  dark  soe'er  it  seems,  may  tend, 
By  ways  I  cannot  comprehend, 
To  some  unguessed  benignant  end; 

That  every  loss  and  lapse  may  gain 
The  clear-aired  heights  by  steps  of  pain, 
And  never  cross  is  borne  in  vain. 

The  test  of  a  poet's  theology  is  his  view  of  sin.  If 
he  ignores  or  condones  sin,  he  shows  that  he  has  only 
a  superficial  conception  of  human  nature,  and  is  an  un- 
trustworthy moral  guide.  Sin  is  the  one  blot  upon 
this  fair  world,  the  one  sorrow  and  shame  over  which 
angels  weep.  But  excusing  sin  or  glorying  in  it  is  so 
much  a  matter  of  pride,  that  the  poet's  readiest  path 
to  popularity  is  that  of  catering  to  unconscientious 
self-esteem.  When  Swinburne  follows  natural  im- 
pulses in  his  "  Laus  Veneris,"  it  is  corrupted  nature 
that  he  follows.  Only  the  Spirit  of  God  can  rectify 
these  impulses  and  correct  man's  view.  Of  all  our 


WHITTIER'S  CONVICTION  OF  SIN  137 

American  poets  Whittier  is  the  most  sane  and  true,  be- 
cause at  the  basis  of  his  poetry  there  is  genuine  con- 
viction of  sin.  Like  John  Woolman,  he  had  "  felt  the 
depth  and  extent  of  the  misery  of  his  fellow  creatures, 
separated  from  the  divine  harmony — and  he  was 
mixed  with  them  and  henceforth  might  not  consider 
himself  a  distinct  and  separate  being."  Like  Wool- 
man, he  could  feel  for  the  sins  of  others  because  he 
had  first  felt  the  evil  of  sin  in  his  own  heart.  "  It 
was  in  no  mocking  humility,"  he  savs,  "  that  I  wrote 
in  'Andrew  Rykman  '  " : 

I,  who  hear  with  secret  shame 
Praise  that  paineth  more  than  blame, 
Rich  alone  in  favors  lent, 
Virtuous  by  accident, 
Doubtful  where  I  fain  would  rest, 
Frailest  where  I  seem  the  best, 
Only  strong  for  lack  of  test. 

My  mind  has  been  a  good  deal  exercised  of  late  on  the 
subject  of  religious  obligation.  The  prayer  of  Cowper  is 
sometimes  in  my  mind:  "Oh,  for  a  closer  walk  with  God!" 
I  feel  that  there  are  many  things  of  the  world  between  me 
and  the  realization  of  a  quiet  communion  with  the  pure  and 
Holy  Spirit.  Alas  for  human  nature  in  its  best  estate!  There 
is  no  upward  tendency  in  it.  It  looks  downward.  It  is,  in- 
deed, of  the  earth.  .  .  I  know  my  own  weakness  and  frailty, 
and  I  am  humbled  rather  than  exalted  by  homage  which  I  do 
not  deserve.  As  the  swift  years  pass,  the  eternal  Realities 
seem  taking  the  place  of  the  shadows  and  illusions  of  time. 

In  his  later  years  he  writes : 

The  unescapable  sense  of  sin  in  thought  and  deed  makes  the 
boldest  of  us  cowards.  I  believe  in  God  as  Justice,  Goodness, 
Tenderness — in  one  word,  Love — and  yet  my  trust  in  him  is 
not  strong  enough  to  overcome  the  natural  shrinking  from 


138  TRUST    IN    THE    ALL-MERCIFUL 

the  law  of  death.  Even  our  Master  prayed  that,  if  it  were 
possible,  the  cup  might  pass  from  him.  .  .  I  have  to  lament 
over  protracted  seasons  of  doubt  and  darkness,  to  shrink  back 
from  the  discovery  of  some  latent  unfaithfulness  and  insin- 
cerity, to  find  evil  at  the  bottom  of  seeming  good,  to  abhor 
myself  for  selfishness  and  pride  and  vanity,  which  at  times 
manifest  themselves — in  short,  to  find  the  law  of  sin  and 
death  still  binding  me.  My  temperament,  ardent,  impetuous, 
imaginative,  powerfully  acted  upon  from  without,  keenly  sus- 
ceptible to  all  influences  from  the  intellectual  world  as  well  as 
to  those  of  nature  in  her  varied  manifestations,  is,  I  fear,  ill 
adapted  to  that  quiet,  introverted  state  of  patient  and  passive 
waiting  for  direction  and  support  under  these  trials  and  diffi- 
culties. 

He  felt  impelled  to  express  his  trust  in  the  mercy 
of  the  All-Merciful,  "  yet  with  a  solemn  recognition 
of  the  awful  consequences  of  alienation  from  Him, 
and  a  full  realization  of  the  truth  that  sin  and  suffer- 
ing are  inseparable." 

These  quotations  from  his  letters  enable  us  to  under- 
stand the  more  condensed  expressions  of  his  poems. 
"  What  the  Voice  Said  "  is  significant : 

"  Know'st  thou  not  all  germs  of  evil 

In  thy  heart  await  their  time? 

Not  thyself,  but  God's  restraining, 

Stays  their  growth  of  crime. 


Earnest  words  must  needs  be  spoken 
When  the  warm  heart  bleeds  or  burns 

With  its  scorn  of  wrong,  or  pity 
For  the  wronged,  by  turns. 

But,  by  all  thy  nature's  weakness, 
Hidden  faults  and  follies  known, 

Be  thou,  in  rebuking  evil, 
Conscious  of  thine  own!  " 


THE    LOVE    ETERNAL  139 

"  My  Namesake  "  might  well  be  a  portrait  of  Whittier 
himself : 

"  While  others  trod  the  altar  stairs 

He  faltered  like  the  publican; 
And,  while  they  praised  as  saints,  his  prayers 
Were  those  of  sinful  man. 

"  For,  awed  by  Sinai's  Mount  of  Law, 
The  trembling  faith  alone  sufficed, 
That,  through  its  cloud  and  flame,  he  saw 
The  sweet,  sad  face  of  Christ!" 

And  it  is  in  Christ  alone  that  he  puts  his  trust  either 
for  himself  or  for  the  world  of  sinners : 

"  Blind  must  be  their  close-shut  eyes 
Where  like  night  the  sunshine  lies, 
Fiery-linked  the  self-forged  chain 
Binding  ever  sin  to  pain, 
Strong  their  prison-house  of  will, 
But  without  He  waiteth  still. 

"  Not  with  hatred's  undertow 
Doth  the  Love  Eternal  flow; 
Every  chain  that  spirits  wear 
Crumbles  in  the  breath  of  prayer; 
And  the  penitent's  desire 
Opens  every  gate  of  fire. 

"  Still  Thy  love,  O  Christ  arisen, 
Yearns  to  reach  these  souls  in  prison! 
Through  all  depths  of  sin  .and  loss 
Drops  the  plummet  of  Thy  cross! 
Never  yet  abyss  was  found 
Deeper  than  that  cross  could  sound!"12 

And  here  is  a  fragment,  found  among  his  papers,  in 
his  handwriting,  evidently  belonging  to  some  poem 
he  never  finished : 

13  "  The  Grave  by  the  Lake," 


I4O  WHITTIERS   VIEW    OF    CHRIST 

The  dreadful  burden  of  our  sins  we  feel, 

The  pain  of  wounds  which  Thou  alone  canst  heal, 

To  whom  our  weakness  is  our  strong  appeal. 

From  the  black  depths,  the  ashes,  and  the  dross 
Of  our  waste  lives,  we  reach  out  to  Thy  cross, 
And  by  its  fullness  measure  all  our  loss! 

That  holy  sign  reveals  Thee:  throned  above 
No  Moloch  sits,  no  false,  vindictive  Jove — 
Thou  art  our  Father,  and  Thy  name  is  Love! 

Whittier  declares  that  he  has  become  convinced 
of  the  Divinity  of  Christ,  but  he  adds :  "  I  cannot  look 
on  him  as  other  than  a  man  like  ourselves,  through 
whom  the  Divine  was  made  miraculously  manifest. 
Jesus  of  Nazareth  was  a  man,  the  Christ  was  a  God — 
a  new  revelation  of  the  Eternal  in  time."  But  he  also 
speaks  of  Christ  as  "  Immanuel,  God  with  us.  God  is 
one,"  he  said ;  "  Christ  is  the  same  Eternal  One,  mani- 
fested in  our  humanity,  and  in  time;  the  Holy  Spirit 
is  the  same  Christ  manifested  within  us."  No  reason- 
able Trinitarian  can  object  to  this  latter  statement,  and 
by  it  we  must  interpret  the  statement  that  goes  before. 
In  the  earlier  declaration  he  is  only  solicitous  to  guard 
our  Lord's  perfect  humanity;  in  the  latter  he  asserts 
that  this  humanity  is  divine;  in  other  words,  that 
Jesus  is  the  Christ.  Though  his  declaration  does  not 
define  the  relations  of  the  Three,  nor  even  call  them 
persons,  it  is  not  a  Unitarian  statement.  It  may  be 
Sabellian,  but  it  recognizes  at  least  the  Deity  of  Christ, 
and  gives  him  supreme  place  in  affection  and  service. 

Only  once  does  our  poet  struggle  with  the  mystery 
of  the  Trinity,  and  the  solution  which  he  gives  is 
not  a  speculative,  but  a  practical  one : 


A    PRACTICAL   VIEW   OF   THE   TRINITY 

At  morn  I  prayed,  "  I  fain  would  see 
How  Three  are  One,  and  One  is  Three; 
Read  the  dark  riddle  unto  me." 


In  vain  I  turned,  in  weary  quest, 

Old  pages,  where  (God  give  them  rest!) 

The  poor  creed-mongers  dreamed  and  guessed. 


Then  something  whispered,  "  Dost  thou  pray 
For  what  thou  hast?    This  very  day 
The  Holy  Three  have  crossed  thy  way. 

"  Did  not  the  gifts  of  sun  and  air 

To  good  and  ill  alike  declare 

The  all-compassionate  Father's  care\? 

"  In  the  white  soul  that  stooped  to  raise 

The  lost  one  from  her  evil  ways, 

Thou  saw'st  the  Christ,  whom  angels  praise! 

"A  bodiless  Divinity, 

The  still  small  Voice  that  spake  to  thee 

Was  the  Holy  Spirit's  mystery! 


"  The  equal  Father  in  rain  and  sun, 
His  Christ  in  the  good  to  evil  done, 
His  Voice  in  thy  soul; — and  the  Three  are  One!  " 


And  my  heart  answered,  "  Lord,  I  see 
How  Three  are  One,  and  One  is  Three; 
Thy  riddle  hath  been  read  to  me!" 

It  may  be  doubted  whether  this  solution  fully  an- 
swers the  demands  of  Scripture.  We  have  there  a 
recognition  of  personal  relations  of  the  Father  to  the 
Son,  and  of  the  Son  to  the  Spirit,  which  go  beyond 
the  terms  of  Whittier's  statement.  But  all  that  is 


142.  ACCEPTANCE    OF    CHRIST  S    SACRIFICE 

positive  in  his  utterance  we  may  accept  with  glad- 
ness, only  adding  that  there  is  a  yet  larger  truth 
which  he  had  not  perceived.  Enough  for  our  present 
purpose  that  he  depended  on  Christ  alone  for  salva- 
tion, in  -this  world  and  in  the  world  to  come.  "  I  am 
no  Calvinist,"  he  says, 

But  I  feel  in  looking  over  my  life — double-motived  and 
full  of  failures — that  I  cannot  rely  upon  word  or  work  of 
mine  to  offset  sins  and  shortcomings,  but  upon  Love  alone. 
.  .  Alas,  if  I  have  been  a  servant  at  all,  I  have  been  an  un- 
profitable one;  and  yet  I  have  loved  goodness,  and  have 
longed  to  bring  my  imaginative  poetic  temperament  into  true 
subjection.  I  stand  ashamed  and  almost  despairing  before 
holy  and  pure  ideals.  As  I  read  the  New  Testament  I  feel 
how  weak,  irresolute,  and  frail  I  am,  and  how  little  I  can  rely 
on  anything  save  our  God's  mercy  and  infinite  compassion, 
which  I  reverently  and  thankfully  own  have  followed  me 
through  life,  and  the  assurance  of  which  is  my  sole  ground 
of  hope  for  myself,  and  for  those  I  love  and  pray  for. 

He  repudiated  every  moral  and  religious  scheme 
which  makes  man  sufficient  to  himself.  Neither  Stoi- 
cism nor  Epicureanism  could  satisfy  his  needs.  "  I  am 
more  and  more  astonished,"  he  writes, 

That  such  a  man  as  Confucius  could  have  made  his  appear- 
ance amidst  the  dull  and  dreary  commonplaces  of  his  people. 
No  wiser  soul  ever  spoke  of  right  and  duty,  but  his  maxims 
have  no  divine  sanction,  and  his  pictures  of  a  perfect  so- 
ciety have  no  perspectives  opening  to  eternity.  Our  Doctor 
Franklin  was  quite  of  the  Confucius  order — though  a  very 
much  smaller  man.  .  .  I  cannot  help  believing  in  prayer  for 
spiritual  things.  Being  fully  possessed  of  Christ,  then  it  is 
he  that  prays. 

And  his  poem  "  The  Crucifixion  "  shows  his  accept- 
ance of  the  outward  sacrifice  offered  in  his  behalf,  as 


"  THE    CRUCIFIXION  "  143 

well  as  of  the  inward  renewal  and  help  of  Christ's 
Spirit : 

That  Sacrifice! — the  death  of  Him, — 
The  Christ  of  God,  the  Holy  One! 
Well  may  the  conscious  Heaven  grow  dim, 
And  blacken  the  beholding  Sun! 

Well  may  the  temple-shrine  grow  dim, 
And  shadows  veil  the  Cherubim, 
When  He,  the  chosen  one  of  Heaven, 
A  sacrifice  for  guilt  is  given! 

And  shall  the  sinful  heart,  alone, 

Behold  unmoved  the  fearful  hour, 
When  Nature  trembled  on  her  throne, 
And  Death  resigned  his  iron  power? 
Oh,  shall  the  heart— whose  sinfulness 
Gave  keenness  to  His  sore  distress, 
And  added  to  His  tears  of  blood — 
Refuse  its  trembling  gratitude? 

There  was  a  time  when  Orthodox  Quakers  were 
shy  of  publicly  joining  with  abolitionists.  This  threw 
Whittier  in  with  the  Hicksites,  though  he  belonged  to 
the  Orthodox.  He  felt  that  a  sound  belief  required 
sound  practice,  and  in  remonstrating  with  his  brethren, 
he  took  occasion  to  draw  from  that  belief  an  argu- 
ment for  duty.  "  What  will  it  avail  us,"  he  writes, 

If,  while  boasting  of  our  soundness  and  of  our  enmity  to 
the  delusion  of  Hicksism,  we  neglect  to  make  a  practical 
application  of  our  belief  to  ourselves?  if  we  neglect  to  seek 
for  ourselves  that  precious  atonement  which  we  are  so 
ready  to  argue  in  favor  of?  I  do  not  undervalue  a  sound 
belief,  but  at  the  same  time  I  believe  it  may  be  "held"  in 
unrighteousness.  I  do  not  dare  to  claim  to  be  any  the  better 
for  my  orthodox  principles.  The  mercy  of  God  is  my  only 
hope. 


144  "  OUR    MASTER  " 

His  poem  "  The  Over-Heart "  seems  like  a  reply 
to  Emerson's  too  intellectual  doctrines  of  the  Over- 
Soul,  and  to  his  overstatement  of  man's  independence : 

The  world  sits  at  the  feet  of  Christ, 
Unknowing,  blind,  and  unconsoled; 
It  yet  shall  touch  His  garment's  fold, 

And  feel  the  heavenly  Alchemist 
Transform  its  very  dust  to  gold. 

To  a  young  physician,  with  Dore's  picture  of  Christ 
healing  the  sick,  he  sent  his  poem,  "  The  Healer  " : 

So  stood  of  old  the  holy  Christ 

Amidst  the  suffering  throng; 
With  whom  His  lightest  touch  sufficed 

To  make  the  weakest  strong. 

That  healing  gift  He  lends  to  them 

Who  use  it  in  His  name; 
The  power  that  filled  His  garment's  hem 

Is  evermore  the  same. 

That  Good  Physician  liveth  yet 

Thy  friend  and  guide  to  be; 
The  Healer  by  Gennesaret 

Shall  walk  the  rounds  with  thee. 

"  Our  Master  "  is  a  confession  of  faith  in  Christ  which 
has  passed  into  the  hymnology  of  all  the  churches : 

Immortal  Love,  forever  full, 

Forever  flowing  free, 
Forever  shared,  forever  whole, 

A  never-ebbing  sea! 

Our  outward  lips  confess  the  name 

All  other  names  above; 
Love  only  knoweth  whence  it  came 

And  comprehendeth  love. 


WHITTIER    NOT    FAR    FROM    CALVINISM  145 

We  may  not  climb  the  heavenly  steeps 
To  bring  the  Lord  Christ  down: 

In  vain  we  search  the  lowest  deeps, 
For  Him  no  depths  can  drown. 

But  warm,  sweet,  tender,  even  yet 

A  present  help  is  He; 
And  faith  has  still  its  Olivet, 

And  love  its  Galilee. 

The  healing  of  His  seamless  dress 

Is  by  our  beds  of  pain; 
We  touch  Him  in  life's  throng  and  press, 

And  we  are  whole  again. 

Through  Him  the  first  fond  prayers  are  said 

Our  lips  of  childhood  frame, 
The  last  low  whispers  of  our  dead 

Are  burdened  with  His  name. 

Our  Lord  and  Master  of  us  all! 

Whate'er  our  name  or  sign, 
We  own  Thy  sway,  we  hear  Thy  call, 

We  test  our  lives  by  Thine. 

"  There  is  something  in  the  doctrine  of  total  de- 
pravity and  regeneration,"  Whittier  wrote.  He  was 
not  so  far  away  from  Calvinism  as  he  thought.  "  We 
are  born  selfish,"  he  continues.  "  The  discipline  of 
life  develops  the  higher  qualities  of  character,  in  a 
greater  or  less  degree.  It  is  the  conquering  of  in- 
nate selfish  propensities  that  makes  the  saint;  and 
the  giving  up  unduly  to  impulses  that  in  their  origin 
are  necessary  to  the  preservation  of  life  that  makes 
the  sinner."  He  believed  that,  as  heavenly  mercy  has 
provided  the  sacrifice  for  sin,  so  heavenly  power  must 
make  the  sinner  willing  to  accept  it.  "  Between  the 
Gates  "  represents  a  younger  pilgrim  as  seeking  from 


146          FAITH    IN    THE    TRIUMPH    OF    GOODNESS 

an  older  a  help  that  can  come  alone  from  God.     But 
the  elder  pilgrim  answers : 

"  Thy  prayer,  my  son,  transcends  my  gift; 

No  power  is  mine,"  the  sage  replied, 
"  The  burden  of  a  soul  to  lift 

Or  stain  of  sin  to  hide. 

"  Howe'er  the  outward  life  may  seem, 

For  pardoning  grace  we  all  must  pray; 
No  man  his  brother  can  redeem 
Or  a  soul's  ransom  pay. 

"  With  deeper  voice  than  any  speech 
Of  mortal  lips  from  man  to  man, 
What  earth's  unwisdom  may  not  teach 
The  Spirit  only  can." 

"  How  much  of  sin  and  want  and  pain  there  is  in 
the  world !  "  so  he  writes.  "  I  wonder  if  it  is  all  neces- 
sary— if  it  cannot  be  helped.  The  terrible  mystery 
sometimes  oppresses  me,  but  I  hold  fast  my  faith  in 
God's  goodness,  and  the  ultimate  triumph  of  that 
goodness." 

What  to  thee  is  shadow,  to  Him  is  day, 

And  the  end  He  knoweth, 
And  not  on  a  blind' and  aimless  way 

The  spirit  goeth. 

Nothing  before,  nothing  behind; 

The  steps  of  Faith 
Fall  on  the  seeming  void,  and  find 

The  rock  beneath. 

Leaning  on  Him,  make  with  reverent  meekness 

His  own  thy  will, 

And  with  strength  from  Him  shall  thy  utter 
weakness 

Life's  task  fulfil; 


WHITTIER    NOT    A    UNIVERSALIST  147 

And  that  cloud  itself,  which  now  before  thee 

Lies  dark  in  view, 
Shall  with  beams  of  light  from  the  inner  glory 

Be  stricken  through.13 

To  a  letter  from  an  inquiring  friend  Whittier  re- 
plied : 

I  am  not  a  Universalist,  for  I  believe  in  the  possibility  of 
the  perpetual  loss  of  the  soul  that  persistently  turns  away 
from  God,  in  the  next  life  as  in  this.  But  I  do  believe  that 
the  divine  love  and  compassion  follow  us  in  all  worlds,  and 
that  the  heavenly  Father  will  do  the  best  that  is  possible  for 
every  creature  that  he  has  made.  What  that  will  be,  must  be 
left  to  his  infinite  wisdom  and  goodness.  I  would  refer  thee 
to  a  poem  of  mine,  "  The  Answer,"  as  containing  in  a  few 
words  my  belief  in  this  matter. 

And  these  are  his  words : 

"  Though  God  be  good  and  free  be  heaven, 

No  force  divine  can  love  compel; 
\nd,  though  the  song  of  sins  forgiven 
May  sound  through  lowest  hell, 

"  The  sweet  persuasion  of  His  voice 

Respects  thy  sanctity  of  will. 
He  giveth  day:  thou  hast  thy  choice 
To  walk  in  darkness  still. 

"  Forever  round  the  Mercy-seat 

The  guiding  lights  of  Love  shall  burn; 
But  what  if,  habit-bound,  thy  feet 
Shall  lack  the  will  to  turn? 

"  What  if  thine  eye  refuse  to  see, 

Thine  ear  of  Heaven's  free  welcome  fail, 
And  thou  a  willing  captive  be, 
Thyself  thy  own  dark  jail?" 

»  "  My  Soul  and  I." 


148  "  THE    CRY    OF   A   LOST    SOUL  " 

"  The  Vision  of  Echard  "  shows,  however,  that  it  was 
no  outward  punishment,  but  rather  inward  suffering, 
that  he  feared  for  the  lost: 

"  The  heaven  ye  seek,  the  hell  ye  fear, 
Are  with  yourselves  alone." 

But  he  still  had  hope  for  all  men.  He  believed  that 
the  same  inward  voice  that  spoke  to  him  speaks  also 
to  men  of  every  Christian  sect  and  even  to  the  heathen. 
That  voice  is  the  voice  of  Christ,  and  he  who  trusts 
it  and  obeys  is  saved : 

All  souls  that  struggle  and  aspire, 

All  hearts  of  prayer  by  thee  are  lit; 
And,  dim  or  clear,  thy  tongues  of  fire 

On  dusky  tribes  and  twilight  centuries  sit. 

Nor  bounds,  nor  clime,  nor  creed  thou  know'st, 

Wide  as  our  need  thy  favors  fall; 
The  white  wings  of  the  Holy  Ghost 

Stoop,  seen  or  unseen,  o'er  the  heads  of  all.  M 

"All  souls  are  Thine;  the  wings  of  morning  bear 
None  from  that  Presence  which  is  everywhere, 
Nor  hell  itself  can  hide,  for  Thou  art  there. 

"  Through  sins  of  sense,  perversities  of  will, 
Through  doubt  and  pain,  through  guilt  and 

shame  and  ill, 
Thy  pitying  eye  is  on  Thy  creature  still. 

"Wilt  Thou  not  make,  Eternal  Source  and  Goal! 
In  Thy  long  years,  life's  broken  circle  whole, 
And  change  to  praise  the  cry  of  a  lost  soul?  "* 

Whittier's  firm  faith  in  personal  immortality  has 
made  his  poems  a  treasure  of  comfort  to  the  bereaved 

14  "  The  Shadow  and  the  Light."  *'  "  The  Cry  of  a  Lost  Soul." 


FAITH    IN    PERSONAL    IMMORTALITY  149 

and  sorrowing.  "  Emerson  once  said  to  me,"  he 
writes, 

"  If  there  is  a  future  life  for  us,  it  is  well;  if  there  is  not,  it 
is  well  also."  For  myself,  I  trust  in  the  mercy  of  the  All- 
Merciful.  What  is  best  for  us  we  shall  have,  and  Life  and 
Love  are  best.  .  .  What  a  brief  and  sad  life  this  of  ours 
would  be,  if  it  did  not  include  the  possibility  of  a  love  that 
takes  hold  of  eternity!  .  .  There  is  no  great  use  in  arguing 
the  question  of  immortality;  one  must  feel  its  truth;  you 
cannot  climb  into  heaven  on  a  syllogism.  .  .  There  are  some 
self-satisfied  souls  who,  as  Charles  Lamb  says,  "  can  stalk 
into  futurity  on  stilts";  but  there  are  more  Fearings  and 
Despondencys  than  Greathearts,  in  view  of  the  "  loss  of  all 
we  know."  .  .  I  think  my  loved  ones  are  still  living  and  await- 
ing me.  And  I  wait  and  trust.  And  yet  how  glad  and  grate- 
ful I  should  be  to  know.  .  .  I  have  the  instinct  of  immor- 
tality, but  the  conditions  of  that  life  are  unknown.  I  can- 
not conceive  what  my  own  identity  and  that  of  dear  ones 
gone  will  be.  .  .  Yet  I  believe  that  I  shall  have  the  same 
friends  in  that  other  world  that  I  have  here,  the  same  loves 
and  aspirations  and  occupations. 

And  in  his  eightieth  year  he  writes :  "  The  great  ques- 
tion of  the  Future  Life  is  almost  ever  with  me.  I  can- 
not answer  it,  but  I  can  trust."  His  biographer 
tells  us  that  there  was  not  a  shadow  of  doubt  in  his 
mind  concerning  the  immortality  of  the  soul;  and 
that  one  day,  when  speaking  of  his  own  hope  and  ex- 
pectation for  the  life  to  come,  he  sadly  said :  "  I  wish 
Emerson  could  have  believed  this."  "  It  saddened 
him  to  feel  that  one  whom  he  so  deeply  loved  and 
revered  had  not  been  sustained  by  this  most  passion- 
ate longing  of  our  human  nature." 

In  the  summer  of  1882,  Whittier  wrote  the  fol- 
lowing lines  on  the  fly-leaf  of  a  volume  of  Longfel- 
low's poems : 


I5O  "  SNOW-BOUND  " 

Hushed  now  the  sweet  consoling  tongue 
Of  him  whose  lyre  the  Muses  strung; 
His  last  low  swan-song  has  been  sung! 

His  last!  And  ours,  dear  friend,  is  near; 
As  clouds  that  rake  the  mountains  here, 
We  too  shall  pass  and  disappear. 

Yet  howsoever  changed  or  tost, 
Not  even  a  wreath  of  mist  is  lost, 
No  atom  can  itself  exhaust. 

So  shall  the  soul's  superior  force 
Live  on  and  run  its  endless  course 
In  God's  unlimited  universe. 

And  we,  whose  brief  reflections  seem 
To  fade  like  clouds  from  lake  and  stream, 
Shall  brighten  in  a  holier  beam. 

In  "  Snow-Bound,"  our  poet  touchingly  records  the 
family  group  that  circled  round  the  hearth  of  early 
days,  and  wonders  where  the  dear  members  of  that 
household  now  are : 

O  Time  and  Change! — with  hair  as  gray 
As  was  my  sire's  that  winter  day, 
How  strange  it  seems,  with  so  much  gone 
,  Of  life  and  love,  to  still  live  on! 

Ah,  brother!  only, I  and  thou 
Are  left  of  all  that  circle  now, — 
The  dear  home  faces  whereupon 
That  fitful  firelight  paled  and  shone. 
Henceforward,  listen  as  we  will, 
The  voices  of  that  hearth  are  still; 
Look  where  we  may,  the  wide  earth  o'er, 
Those  lighted  faces  smile  no  more. 
We  tread  the  paths  their  feet  have  worn, 
:          We  sit  beneath  their  orchard  trees, 

We  hear,  like  them,  the  hum  of  bees 
And  rustle  of  the  bladed  corn; 


A    GENIUS    RUSTIC    AND    HOMELY  15! 

We  turn  the  pages  that  they  read, 

Their  written  words  we  linger  o'er, 
But  in  the  sun  they  cast  no  shade, 
No  voice  is  heard,  no  sign  is  made, 

No  step  is  on  the  conscious  floor! 
Yet  Love  will  dream,  and  Faith  will  trust, 
(Since  He  who  knows  our  need  is  just,) 
That  somehow,  somewhere,  meet  we  must. 
Alas  for  him  who  never  sees 
The  stars  shine  through  his  cypress-trees! 
Who,  hopeless,  lays  his  dead  away, 
Nor  looks  to  see  the  breaking  day 
Across  the  mournful  marbles  play! 
Who  hath  not  learned,  in  hours  of  faith, 

The  truth  to  flesh  and  sense  unknown, 
That  Life  is  ever  lord  of  Death, 

And  Love  can  never  lose  its  own! 

If  Whittier  had  written  no  other  poem  than  this, 
he  would  have  earned  immortality  as  a  poet.  Not  by 
his  worst,  but  by  his  best,  must  the  poet  be  judged. 
The  defects  of  Whittier's  poetry  are  easy  to  perceive 
and  easy  to  criticize.  His  genius  was  rustic  and 
homely ;  he  never  learned  compression ;  he  spun  out 
his  verse  after  the  divine  afflatus  had  ceased;  he 
moralized  when  he  should  have  left  his  story  to  tell  its 
own  lesson.  But  all  this  is  only  to  say  that  he  regarded 
poetry  as  a  means,  rather  than  as  an  end,  and  that  he 
sought  always  to  serve  truth  and  righteousness  there- 
by. There  can  be  no  more  striking  contrast  in  this 
respect  than  that  between  him  and  Goethe.  Art  for 
art's  sake  was  to  Whittier  a  prostitution  of  genius. 
"  A  long  poem,"  he  said,  "  unconsecrated  to  religion 
and  humanity,  would  be  a  criminal  waste  of  life."  He 
aimed  to  fulfil  Paul's  injunction  to  do  all  to  the  glory 
of  God,  and  the  glory  of  God  meant  for  him  the  good 


152  A    NATURAL    BALLADIST 

of  man.  So  he  has  been  called  "  the  Quaker  priest " ; 
and  much  of  his  poetry  is  little  more  than  rhythmical 
preaching.  But  it  came  from  the  heart,  and  it  touched 
the  heart.  It  was  the  utterance  of  an  uncorrupted 
conscience,  and  it  stirred  the  conscience.  When  Lowell 
was  a  callow  youth,  and  Longfellow  was  absorbed  in 
his  books,  and  Emerson  was  wrapped  in  philosophic 
clouds,  Whittier  alone  gave  himself  body  and  soul  to 
the  cause  of  freedom,  and  compelled  all  the  rest  to  fol- 
low. More  than  all  other  poets  combined  he  roused 
our  people  to  see  the  evil  of  slavery  and  at  unspeakable 
cost  to  abolish  it. 

He  was  a  natural  balladist.  His  poetry  was  simple 
and  direct,  like  that  of  Burns ;  his  prose  had  the  lofty 
swell  and  exuberance  of  Milton.  Indian  legends  at- 
tracted him,  but  he  never  mastered  the  improvidence 
of  that  dying  race,  as  did  Longfellow;  the  wit  and 
humor  of  New  England  did  not  impress  him  as  it  im- 
pressed Lowell.  But  the  courage  of  a  humble  soul 
was  never  more  thrillingly  described  than  in  "  Barbara 
Frietchie,"  nor  the  pathos  of  life  more  touchingly 
than  in  that  ballad  of  "  Maud  Muller,"  in  which  the 
New  England  Judge  and  the  village  maid  meet  for  one 
moment  and  part  to  see  each  other  again  only  as 
memory  makes  recall  : 

Alas  for  maiden,  alas  for  Judge, 

For  rich  repiner  and  household  drudge! 

God  pity  them  both!  and  pity  us  all, 
Who  vainly  the  dreams  of  youth  recall. 

For  of  all  sad  words  of  tongue  or  pen, 

The  saddest  are  these:  "  It  might  have  been! " 


REWARDS    FOR    SERVICE    AND    SACRIFICE  153 

Ah,  well!  for  us  all  some  sweet  hope  lies 
Deeply  buried  from  human  eyes; 

And,  in  the  hereafter,  angels  may 
Roll  the  stone  from  its  grave  away! 

We  have  had  no  poet  more  truly  Christian,  none 
who  laid  his  gifts  more  completely  at  the  feet  of 
Christ,  none  who  more  completely  identified  himself 
with  the  suffering  and  oppressed.  His  life  of  sacrifice 
was  not  permitted  to  go  unrewarded.  After  twenty 
years  of  privation,  in  which  he  was  regarded  as  a  mere 
rhymester  and  reformer,  the  world  began  to  perceive 
that  he  was  a  true  poet,  and  that  his  homely  verse 
was  most  truly  American.  Not  only  the  friendship  of 
the  learned  and  the  good,  but  an  unexpected  prosperity 
and  comfort,  crowned  his  latter  days.  The  promise 
of  "  manifold  more  in  this  present  time "  was  ful- 
filled to  him.  On  his  eightieth  birthday  he  was  pre- 
sented with  a  portfolio  containing  hundreds  of  auto- 
graphs of  Massachusetts  officials,  the  signatures  of 
"  fifty-nine  United  States  Senators,  the  entire  bench  of 
the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  headed  by 
Chief  Justice  Waite,  Speaker  Carlisle  of  the  House  of 
Representatives,  and  three  hundred  and  thirty  mem- 
bers of  the  House  coming  from  every  State  and  Ter- 
ritory in  the  Union.  To  these  were  added  the  names 
of  many  private  citizens  of  distinction,  such  as  George 
Bancroft,  Robert  C.  Winthrop,  James  G.  Elaine,  and 
Frederick  Douglass."  This  portfolio  only  feebly  ex- 
pressed the  affection  in  which  he  was  held  by  the  whole 
American  people,  and  their  gratitude  for  his  influence 
and  example.  Like  Abraham  Lincoln,  he  was  a  man 


154  "THE  ETERNAL  GOODNESS 

of  the  people,  and  a  man  for  the  hour.     He  was  hon- 
ored because  he  had  served. 

Whittier  lived  to  be  eighty-five  years  of  age. 
Bachelor  as  he  was,  he  was  tenderly  cared  for  by 
relatives  and  friends,  and  his  last  days  were  quiet 
and  restful.  His  hymn  entitled  "  The  Eternal  Good- 
ness "  is  a  confession  of  faith  which  has  comforted 
many  of  the  afflicted : 

I  long  for  household  voices  gone, 

For  vanished  smiles  I  long, 
But  God  hath  led  my  dear  ones  on, 

And  He  can  do  no  wrong. 

I  know  not  what  the  future  hath 

Of  marvel  or  surprise, 
Assured  alone  that  life  and  death 

His  mercy  underlies. 

And  if  my  heart  and  flesh  are  weak 

To  bear  an  untried  pain, 
The  bruised  reed  He  will  not  break, 

But  strengthen  and  sustain. 

No  offering  of  my  own  I  have, 

Nor  works  my  faith  to  prove; 
I  can  but  give  the  gifts  He  gave, 

And  plead  His  love  for  love. 

And  so  beside  the  Silent  Sea, 

I  wait  the  muffled  oar; 
No  harm  from  Him  can  come  to  me 

On  ocean  or  on  shore. 

I  know  not  where  His  islands  lift 

Their  fronded  palms  in  air; 
I  only  know  I  cannot  drift 

Beyond  His  love  and  care. 


THE    BREWING   OF    SOMA  155 

"  The  end  of  that  man  was  peace."  His  poem 
"  The  Brewing  of  Soma  "  gives  his  prescription  for 
all  earthly  care  and  trouble : 

Dear  Lord  and  Father  of  mankind, 

Forgive  our  foolish  ways! 
Reclothe  us  in  our  rightful  mind, 
In  purer  lives  Thy  service  find, 

In  deeper  reverence,  praise. 

In  simple  trust  like  theirs  who  heard 

Beside  the  Syrian  sea 
The  gracious  calling  of  the  Lord, 
Let  us,  like  them,  without  a  word, 

Rise  up  and  follow  Thee. 

O  Sabbath  rest  by  Galilee! 

O  calm  of  hills  above, 
Where  Jesus  knelt  to  share  with  Thee 
The  silence  of  eternity 

Interpreted  by  love! 

Drop  Thy  still  dews  of  quietness, 

Till  all  our  strivings  cease; 
Take  from  our  souls  the  strain  and  stress, 
And  let  our  ordered  lives  confess 

The  beauty  of  Thy  peace. 

Breathe  through  the  heats  of  our  desire 

Thy  coolness  and  Thy  balm; 
Let  sense  be  dumb,  let  flesh  retire; 
Speak  through  the  earthquake,  wind,  and  fire, 

O  still,  small  voice  of  calm! 

"  My  Psalm  "  is  a  yet  more  convincing  assurance  of 
his  freedom  from  anxiety  with  regard  to  his  own 
future  or  the  future  of  the  world : 

I  mourn  no  more  my  vanished  years: 

Beneath  a  tender  rain, 
An  April  rain  of  smiles  and  tears, 

My  heart  is  young  again. 


156  "  MY    PSALM  " 

The  west  winds  blow,  and,  singing  low, 
I  hear  the  glad  streams  run; 

The  windows  of  my  soul  I  throw 
Wide  open  to  the  sun. 

No  longer  forward  nor  behind 

I  look  in  hope  or  fear; 
But,  grateful,  take  the  good  I  find, 

The  best  of  now  and  here. 

All  as  God  wills,  who  wisely  heeds 

To  give  or  to  withhold, 
And  knoweth  more  of  all  my  needs 

Than  all  my  prayers  have  told! 

Enough  that  blessings  undeserved 
Have  marked  my  erring  track; 

That  wheresoe'er  my  feet  have  swerved, 
His  chastening  turned  me  back; 

That  more  and  more  a  Providence 

Of  love  is  understood, 
Making  the  springs  of  time  and  sense 

Sweet  with  eternal  good; — 

That  death  seems  but  a  covered  way 

Which  opens  into  light, 
Wherein  no  blinded  child  can  stray 

Beyond  the  Father's  sight; 

That  care  and  trial  seem  at  last, 
Through  Memory's  sunset  air, 

Like  mountain  ranges  overpast, 
In  purple  distance  fair; 

That  all  the  jarring  notes  of  life 
Seem  blending  in  a  psalm, 

And  all  the  angles  of  its  strife 
Slow  rounding  into  calm. 

And  so  the  shadows  fall  apart, 
And  so  the  west  winds  play; 

And  all  the  windows  of  my  heart 
I  open  to  the  day. 


THE    HUMBLE    FRIEND   OF   GOD  1 57 

Whittier  illustrates  Augustine's  doctrine  that  humil- 
ity is  the  fundamental  grace  of  the  Christian  character. 
Humility  is  no  mere  self-depreciation;  it  is  a  coming 
down  to  the  humus,  or  hard-pan,  of  actual  fact;  it  is 
the  estimate  of  self  according  to  the  divine  standard, 
which  is  nothing  less  than  absolute  conformity  to  the 
character  of  God.  When  we  compare  ourselves  with 
one  another,  we  may  be  proud ;  when  we  compare  our- 
selves with  infinite  purity  and  benevolence,  we  must 
be  humble.  Humility  is  the  indispensable  condition 
of  religious  knowledge,  for  only  the  childlike  spirit  can 
understand  God;  it  is  the  condition  of  all  spiritual 
power,  for  only  the  receptive  soul  can  be  the  medium 
of  divine  revelation.  The  secret  of  Whittier's  life  and 
work  was  his  humble  faith  in  God.  "  I  believe  in  a 
living  God,"  he  said.  That  is  the  quintessence  of 
Quakerism.  "  The  Friends  "  took  that  name  because 
they  were  first  of  all  God's  friends,  and  then  for  God's 
sake  had  become  friends  to  suffering  and  sinning 
men.  Our  poet  had  learned  that  God  is  not  far  away, 
but  a  present  God,  a  God  here  and  now,  a  God  recon- 
ciled to  men  through  the  infinite  sacrifice  of  his  only 
begotten  Son,  a  God  who  reveals  himself  to  the  con- 
trite spirit  by  an  inner  voice,  condensing  into  a  moment 
his  works  of  power,  and  making  his  servants  mighty  to 
do  and  to  endure.  It  is  this  humble  faith  of  Whittier 
that  has  conquered  criticism,  has  made  "  Snow- 
Bound  "  more  popular  than  Oliver  Goldsmith's  "  De- 
serted Village,"  or  Robert  Burns's  "  Cotter's  Saturday 
Night,"  and  has  given  his  poetry,  in  spite  of  its  defects 
of  rhyme  and  of  compression,  an  imperishable  fame. 
In  the  last  of  his  poems,  written  but  a  few  weeks  be- 


158     A    BLAMELESS    MEMORY    IN    DEATHLESS    SONG 

fore  his  death,  and  addressed  "  To  Oliver  Wendell 
Holmes,"  he  sums  up  this  faith  of  his  life : 

The  hour  draws  near,  howe'er  delayed  and  late, 

When  at  the  Eternal  Gate 
We  leave  the  words  and  works  we  call  our  own, 

And  lift  void  hands  alone 

For  love  to  fill.     Our  nakedness  of  soul 

Brings  to  that  Gate  no  toll; 
Giftless  we  come  to  Him,  who  all  things  gives, 

And  live,  because  He  lives. 

And  I  cannot  better  close  my  essay  than  by  quoting 
the  words  which  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  wrote  in 
memory  of  his  friend : 

"  For  thee,  dear  friend,  there  needs  no  high-wrought  lay, 

To  shed  its  aureole  round  thy  cherished  name, — 
Thou  whose  plain,  home-born  speech  of  Yea  and  Nay 
Thy  truthful  nature  ever  best  became. 

"  Best  loved  and  saintliest  of  our  singing  train, 

Earth's  noblest  tributes  to  thy  name  belong. 
A  lifelong  record  closed  without  a  stain, 

A  blameless  memory,  shrined  in  deathless  song." 


IV 

EDGAR  ALLAN  FOE 


EDGAR  ALLAN  POE 


IN  passing  from  Whittier  to  Poe,  we  learn  how  wide 
is  the  realm  of  poetry.  To  use  Sir  William  Hamil- 
ton's phrase,  the  two  poets  are  separated  by  "  the  whole 
diameter  of  being."  Yet  the  contrast  is  not  abso- 
lute; "  being  "  connects  the  two;  each  of  them  depicts 
life.  If  we  note  the  differences,  we  perceive  that  Whit- 
tier  is  the  most  American  of  our  poets,  while  Poe  is 
well-nigh  devoid  of  national  characteristics.  Whittier 
is  the  poet  of  plain  country  life;  Poe  is  airily  aristo- 
cratic, and  is  at  home  only  in  the  town.  Whittier  grew 
up  amid  the  hardships  of  a  New  England  farm  and  the 
rude  lessons  of  a  New  England  schoolhouse ;  Poe  was 
the  spoiled  child  of  a  Southern  household,  gained  in 
England  his  introduction  to  the  classics,  and  had  some 
part  of  his  training  in  the  University  of  Virginia  and 
in  the  United  States  Military  Academy  at  West  Point 
Whittier  was  a  devotee  of  duty ;  Poe  was  a  devotee  of 
beauty.  Whittier  made  his  poetry  a  lifelong  protest 
against  slavery;  Poe  ignored  all  moral  issues,  and  re- 
garded all  reformers  as  madmen.  Whittier  was  a  man 
of  faith,  looked  upon  conscience  as  the  voice  of  God, 
saw  the  future  lit  up  by  God's  love  and  God's  prom- 
ises, and  so,  held  to  an  optimistic  view  of  the  universe 
and  to  an  unwavering  assurance  of  immortal  life ;  Poe 
was  a  soured  and  self-willed  unbeliever,  esteeming  the 
Bible  to  be  mere  rigmarole  and  the  world  to  be  an 

161 


l62  POE    CONTRASTED    WITH    WHITTIER 

automatic  process  from  nothingness  to  nothingness ; 
a  victim  of  uncontrolled  appetites  which  alternately 
crazed  and  tormented  him,  but  without  God  and  with- 
out hope  either  for  this  world  or  for  the  world  to  come ; 
in  short,  a  poet  already  in  hell  and  singing  only  of 
despair. 

These  are  the  points  of  difference.  Yet  Poe,  as  well 
as  Whittier,  was  a  poet.  In  certain  respects  he  was 
more  highly  endowed.  His  range  was  narrower,  but 
within  that  range  there  was  more  of  imagination;  he 
had  the  critical  instinct,  which  Whittier  lacked,  and  he 
was  our  first  master  of  the  technique  of  poetry;  above 
all,  he  was  a  melodist,  the  music  of  whose  verse,  like 
that  of  Shelley,  lulled  the  senses.1  While  Whittier 
was  immensurably  the  superior  in  the  breadth  and 
substance  of  his  utterance,  Poe  was  the  superior  in 
form.  In  the  early  day  when  pretentious  mediocrity 
crowded  the  stage,  Poe  both  by  example  and  by  pre- 
cept gave  direction  to  our  literary  ventures,  made  dog- 
gerel contemptible,  and  set  a  new  and  better  standard 
of  poetical  success.  That  his  work  was  not  in  vain 
is  proved  by  the  fact  that  some  European  judges,  espe- 
cially among  the  French,  have  called  him  our  greatest 
American  poet. 

It  is  the  purpose  of  this  essay  to  expand  and  to  jus- 
tify these  statements  with  regard  to  Poe,  and  I  can 
best  begin  by  briefly  sketching  his  life.  It  was  the 
pitiful  and  tragic  life  of  a  genius  consumed  by  vanity 
and  enslaved  by  drink.  I  would  be  gentle  in  my  judg- 


1  In  many  ways  the  short  life,  early  excesses  and  insanity,  small  poet- 
ical product  and  melodious  elaboration  of  abstract  and  ideal  qualities  of 
William  Collins  (1721-1759)  furnish  a  remarkable  analogy  to  the  life  and 
work  of  Poe. 


AGREEMENT   AMONG    BIOGRAPHERS  163 

ments,  but  I  would  be  truthful  also.  Let  us  remember 
that  Poe  made  Rufus  Wilmot  Griswold  his  literary 
executor,  and  trusted  him  as  his  biographer.  Griswold 
was  the  most  capable  compiler  of  his  day.  He  was 
nearest  to  the  scenes,  and  was  most  familiar  with  the 
facts  of  Poe's  life.  His  story  was  so  damaging  to  the 
poet's  reputation  that  later  writers  attributed  its  dark 
colors  to  personal  animosity.  The  half  century  that 
has  followed,  however,  although  it  has  witnessed  the 
discovery  of  new  material,  has  invalidated  no  essential 
of  Griswold's  conclusions.  The  "  Life  of  Edgar  Allan 
Poe,"  by  Prof.  George  E.  Woodberry,  printed  in 
1909,  the  hundredth  year  after  Poe's  birth,  is  a  most 
complete  and  thorough  resume  of  all  that  is  really 
known  about  Poe's  history,  and  in  all  substantial  mat- 
ters it  concedes  the  justice  of  Griswold's  earlier  judg- 
ments. It  is  a  calmer  and  tenderer  review  than  Gris- 
wold's, and  the  sad  truth  is  for  the  most  part  left  to 
tell  its  own  story.  But  "  the  archangel  ruined  "  is 
none  the  less  visible,  for  lack  of  the  biographer's  de- 
nunciation. 

Poe's  grandfather,  David,  was  a  stalwart  Irish  im- 
migrant, who  settled  in  Philadelphia.  He  loved  free- 
dom and  hated  England.  He  was  one  of  the  patriots 
of  our  Revolution,  and  a  quartermaster  in  our  Con- 
tinental Army.  General  Poe,  as  he  was  called,  was 
so  proud  and  prosperous  that,  when  his  son  David, 
our  poet's  father,  married  an  actress  and  became  him- 
self an  actor,  the  general  disinherited  him  and  turned 
him  adrift.  Three  children  were  born  of  this  union, 
of  whom  Edgar  was  the  second.  The  parents  led 
the  itinerant  and  obscure  life  of  second-rate  players. 


164  EARLY   TRAINING   OF   POE 

Of  the  father's  end  nothing  is  known.  But  the  mother, 
after  pitiful  struggles  with  poverty  and  appeals  for 
public  sympathy,  died  in  Richmond,  Virginia,  leaving 
her  children  in  utter  destitution.  The  heart  of  the 
grandfather  was  apparently  touched  by  their  need, 
for  he  took  the  elder  son,  William,  under  his  care. 
Rosalie,  the  youngest  child,  found  a  home  with  a  family 
named  Mackenzie.  Mr.  John  Allan,  a  Richmond  to- 
bacco-merchant of  Scottish  birth,  and  his  young  wife, 
who  was  childless,  had  pity  for  Edgar,  the  beautiful 
two-year-old  orphan  boy,  and,  without  adopting  him, 
treated  him  in  almost  all  respects  as  their  son  and  heir. 

It  might  have  seemed  that  the  boy's  fortune  was 
made.  He  entered  a  home  of  comfort  and  even  of 
luxury;  he  became  the  pet  and  admiration  of  the 
household;  pony  and  dogs  enlivened  his  hours  of  rec- 
reation ;  while  under  various  teachers  he  learned  to 
read,  to  draw,  to  declaim,  and  to  dance.  He  was  an 
apt  scholar,  though  impulsive  and  dreamy.  He  had 
inherited  the  histrionic  temperament  and  he  delighted 
in  exhibiting  his  talents.  Mr.  Allan  most  unwisely 
entertained  his  friends  at  dinner  by  lifting  the  little  boy 
with  his  curly  locks  to  a  chair,  upon  which  he  stood 
while  he  held  his  glass  of  wine,  recited  his  verses,  and 
drank  to  the  health  of  the  company.  He  was  subjected 
to  no  real  government;  his  pranks  and  his  caprices 
were  matters  of  amusement;  Southern  hospitality  did 
little  to  correct  his  natural  pride  and  selfishness;  he 
tells  us,  indeed,  that  he  "  was  left  to  the  guidance  of 
his  own  will." 

The  most  peaceful,  and  perhaps  the  happiest,  time 
of  his  life  was  the  lustrum  which  he  spent  at  Stoke- 


A    LUSTRUM    IN    ENGLAND  165 

Newington,  near  London,  under  the  rigorous  tutelage 
of  Doctor  Bransby.  Mr.  Allan  made  a  long  visit  of 
five  years  in  England,  and  Edgar's  time  from  his  sixth 
to  his  eleventh  year  was  usefully  employed  in  study  at 
this  excellent  preparatory  school.  His  tale  entitled 
"  William  Wilson  "  is  in  part  autobiographical,  and  it 
gives  us  a  charming  picture  of  the  boy's  school  life  in 
the  somber  hall  with  its  oaken  ceiling,  and  in  the  maze 
of  its  dormitory  passages.  The  age  and  gloom  of 
English  architecture  made  deep  impression  upon  him ; 
then,  and  only  then,  after  his  earlier  company  with  his 
foster-mother,  does  he  seem  ever  to  have  entered  a 
church.  He  was  an  athlete  among  his  fellows ;  a  quick 
and  capable  scholar ;  but  also  a  boy  of  moods  and  en- 
mities, free  with  his  money  and  on  his  off  days  given 
to  cakes  and  ale.  The  master  of  the  school  recognized 
his  talent,  but  regretted  that  his  guardian  provided 
him  with  so  much  to  spend.  Vacations  were  doubtless 
occupied  in  travel,  for  Poe's  writings  show  familiarity 
with  a  great  number  of  famous  castles  and  donjon- 
keeps,  as  well  as  with  their  blood-curdling  histories. 
These  years  abroad  made  our  poet  a  gentleman  and  a 
scholar,  so  far  as  early  training  could  mold  a  pecu- 
liarly sensitive  and  wilful  spirit. 

The  return  to  Richmond  in  1820  was  followed  by 
three  years  of  schooling  under  Joseph  H.  Clarke,  a 
graduate  of  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  and  then  by  three 
more  years  under  Master  William  Burk.  Poe  was 
easily  the  first  of  his  schoolmates  in  his  Latin  and  his 
French,  but  his  accuracy  and  thoroughness  were  not 
equal  to  his  own  powers  of  perception.  Though 
handsome  in  person,  a  swimmer  and  a  boxer,  he  was 


l66  VERSES    TO    WOMEN 

not  popular  among  his  fellows.  A  certain  moodiness 
and  instability  characterized  him.  This  was  partly 
due  to  the  fact  that  his  better-born  classmates  looked 
down  upon  the  son  of  an  actor  -and  the  recipient  of  a 
guardian's  charity.  Mr.  Allan  himself,  notwithstand- 
ing his  interest  and  indulgence,  was  not  a  man  of  af- 
fectionate nature,  and  it  was  his  wife  who  most  cared 
for  the  boy.  There  seems  indeed  to  have  grown  up 
something  like  estrangement  between  the  guardian 
and  his  young  charge.  Edgar's  leadership  of  a  Thes- 
pian Society  may  have  awakened  fear  that  he  might, 
like  his  parents,  gravitate  to  the  stage.  Poe,  however, 
attracted  women,  and  was  attracted  by  them.  Some 
of  his  earliest  verses  were  written  in  memory  of  a 
married  lady  who  had  spoken  like  a  mother  to  the 
motherless  boy,  and  who  had  soon  after  left  him 
desolate  by  her  death.  The  poem  "  To  Helen  "  was 
the  germ  of  "  Lenore  "  and  of  "  Irene,"  and  we  may 
see  in  it  the  first-fruits  of  the  poet's  genius : 

Helen,  thy  beauty  is  to  me 

Like  those  Nicaean  barks  of  yore, 
That  gently,  o'er  a  perfumed  sea, 

The  weary,  wayworn  wanderer  bore 

To  his  own  native  shore. 

On  desperate  seas  long  wont  to  roam, 
Thy  hyacinth  hair,  thy  classic  face, 

Thy  Naiad  airs,  have  brought  me  home 
To  the  glory  that  was  Greece 
And  the  grandeur  that  was  Rome. 

Lo!  in  yon  brilliant  window-niche 
How  statue-like  I  see  thee  stand, 

The  agate  lamp  within  thy  hand! 
Ah,  Psyche,  from  the  regions  which 
Are  Holy  Land! 


FIRST-FRUITS    OF    POE's    GENIUS  167 

But  there  were  other  verses  to  younger  women  also, 
and  there  was  an  actual  betrothal  of  the  sixteen-year- 
old  poet  to  a  seventeen-year-old  girl.  Parents,  how- 
ever, had  not  been  consulted,  and  these  youthful  fancies 
were  broken  off  when  Edgar,  in  1826,  was  matricu- 
lated in  the  University  of  Virginia,  and  the  young 
lady  had  married  another  man. 

Mr.  J.  H.  Whitty  has  edited  the  most  complete 
critical  edition  of  Poe's  poems,  and  has  prefaced  it  with 
a  minute  and  painstaking  account  of  the  facts  of  the 
poet's  life.  He  has  also  done  good  service  by  ex- 
huming from  the  Library  of  Congress  and  from  the 
old  "  Graham's  Magazine  "  certain  lost  poems  of  our 
author.  One  of  these  is  entitled  "  The  Divine  Right 
of  Kings,"  and  it  exhibits  both  Poe's  susceptibility  to 
female  charms  and  his  early  skill  in  versification.  I 
venture  to  transcribe  it : 

The  only  King  by  right  divine 

Is  Ellen  King,  and  were  she  mine, 

I'd  strive  for  liberty  no  more, 

But  hug  the  glorious  chains  I  wore. 

Her  bosom  is  an  ivory  throne 
Where  tyrant  virtue  reigns  alone; 
No  subject  vices  dare  interfere 
To  check  the  power  that  governs  here. 

Oh!  would  she  deign  to  rule  my  fate, 
I'd  worship  Kings  with  kingly  state, 

And  hold  this  maxim  all  life  long: 

The  King — my  King — can  do  no  wrong. 

Would  that  our  story  of  Poe's  life  might  end  here ! 
But  its  brilliant  promise  was  the  precursor  of  a  gradual 
and  fearful  decline.  Whether  it  was  an  outbreaking  of 


1 68  POE'S    DISSIPATION    AT    COLLEGE 

innate  tendencies  hitherto  repressed  or  a  reaction  from 
his  disappointment  in  love,  his  brief  course  in  college 
was  marked  by  a  recklessness  of  behavior  which  in- 
creased with  his  years  and  ended  in  insanity  and  death. 
He  was  no  mean  scholar,  and  he  made  some  progress 
in  Greek,  and  Spanish,  and  Italian.  But  the  love  for 
drink  which  he  had  learned  at  the  dinner-table  of  his 
guardian,  and  which  was  fostered  by  the  convivial 
habits  of  the  planters'  sons  with  whom  he  associated, 
was  too  much  for  his  self-control,  and  he  gave  way  to 
occasional  intemperance.  The  draughts  which  his 
friends  could  stand  with  apparent  impunity  deprived 
him  of  reason.  A  single  glass  of  wine  excited  him;  a 
second  made  him  garrulous;  a  third  turned  the  whole 
world  into  a  merry-go-round.  It  was  not  the  taste 
of  liquor  which  tempted  him,  but  rather  its  inebriating 
effect.  He  would  toss  off  a  whole  goblet  of  brandy, 
without  sugar  or  water,  and  then  would  be  a  lunatic. 
"  At  Jefferson  University,  Charlottesville,"  he  writes, 
"  I  led  a  very  dissipated  life — the  college  at  that  period 
being  shamefully  dissolute."  But  he  says  long  after- 
ward :  "  I  have  absolutely  no  pleasure  in  the  stimulants 
in  which  I  sometimes  so  madly  indulge.  It  has  not 
been  in  the  pursuit  of  pleasure  that  I  have  periled  life 
and  reputation  and  reason.  It  has  been  in  the  desper- 
ate attempt  to  escape  from  torturing  memories."  He 
added  gambling  to  drunkenness,  and  showed  such  ex- 
travagance in  his  wagers  that  he  soon  lost  caste  with 
his  college  mates.  Poe  had  entered  the  university  in 
February ;  when  its  session  closed  in  the  following  De- 
cember the  young  man's  "  debts  of  honor,"  so  called, 
amounted  to  two  thousand  five  hundred  dollars.  These 


TWO    YEARS    IN    THE   ARMY  169 

Mr.  Allan  refused  to  pay,  and  Poe  left  the  university  in 
humiliation  and  disgrace.  But  he  threw  the  blame  of 
his  discomfiture  entirely  upon  his  patron,  for  he  says 
of  this  incident :  "  In  early  youth  I  deliberately  threw 
away  from  me  a  large  fortune,  rather  than  endure  a 
trivial  wrong."  He  had  forfeited  his  birthright  like 
Esau,  but  he  never,  like  Esau,  repented  with  tears. 

He  was  offered  a  clerkship  in  his  guardian's  count- 
ing-room. But  business  had  no  attractions  for  him, 
and  he  fled  to  Boston.  To  hide  his  mortification  from 
the  world,  to  escape  the  stings  of  conscience,  and  per- 
haps to  subject  himself  to  needed  discipline,  he  enlisted 
under  an  assumed  name,  as  E.  A.  Perry,  in  the  United 
States  army,  and  spent  nearly  two  years  in  the  artil- 
lery service,  first  at  Fort  Independence,  near  Boston, 
and  then  at  Fort  Moultrie,  near  Charleston,  South 
Carolina.  He  was  only  eighteen  when  he  became  a 
soldier,  but  he  gave  his  age  as  twenty-two.  His  con- 
duct in  the  service  was  so  creditable  that  he  was  pro- 
moted to  be  sergeant-major.  His  officers  recognized 
his  superior  education  and  refinement,  and  after  nearly 
two  years  they  used  their  influence  to  secure  his  recon- 
ciliation with  his  guardian.  Mr.  Allan  apparently  sent 
money  for  a  substitute  in  the  army,  which  the  sub- 
stitute did  not  receive,  and  there  was  a  report  that 
Poe  forged  the  signature  of  the  substitute  in  order  to 
appropriate  it.  Certain  it  is  that  Mr.  Allan  was  obliged 
to  pay  the  sum  twice  over,  and  that  he  never,  after 
this,  took  the  young  man  back  into  his  family.  He 
did,  however,  procure  for  him  an  appointment  to  a 
cadetship  at  West  Point,  and  there,  on  July  I,  1830, 
Poe  entered  the  Military  Academy.  But  on  the  fol- 

N 


I7O         POES    FINAL   BREAK    WITH    HIS    PATRON 

lowing  January  twenty-eighth  he  was  dismissed  for 
neglecting  his  duties  as  cadet,  and  for  general  con- 
tempt of  discipline.  He  was  older  than  his  classmates, 
and  took  the  highest  marks  in  mathematics  and  in 
French.  But  he  was  restless,  harsh,  and  satirical, 
given  to  drinking  and  to  escapades,  and  incapable  of 
obedience  as  a  soldier.  Arrest,  punishment,  and  ex- 
pulsion inevitably  followed. 

It  is  no  wonder  that  from  this  time  Mr.  Allan  lost 
all  confidence  in  his  protege,  and  disclaimed  all  respon- 
sibility for  him.  Yet  he  seems  to  have  paid  him  an 
annuity  for  three  following  years,  and  to  have  kept  the 
wolf  from  the  poet's  door  when  he  was  first  struggling 
for  a  standing  in  the  literary  world.  His  guardian's 
generosity  was  all  the  more  creditable,  since  the  first 
Mrs.  Allan,  Poe's  special  friend,  had  died,  and  Mr.  Allan 
had  now  a  child  of  his  own  by  a  second  marriage.  Poe 
went  back  to  Richmond  after  his  expulsion  from  West 
Point,  hoping  still  to  win  back  his  guardian's  favor. 
Mr.  Allan  was  ill,  and  forbidden  to  receive  visitors. 
Poe  disregarded  the  prohibition  of  Mrs.  Allan  and 
made  his  way  into  the  sick-room.  This  angered  Mr. 
Allan,  and  he  lifted  his  cane  to  chastise  Poe,  who  re- 
tired in  complete  discomfiture.  It  was  only  a  fit  re- 
turn for  Poe's  insubordination  and  ingratitude,  and  it 
marked  the  end  of  all  relations  between  them.  In 
1834  Mr.  Allan  died,  and  made  no  mention  of  Poe  in 
his  will.2  From  1831  our  poet  lived  in  Baltimore  with 

2  Poe's  contemptuous  opposition  to  Mr.  Allan's  second  marriage,  and 
Poe's  scandalous  treatment  of  the  second  wife,  must  be  added  to  the 
reasons  for  this  neglect  to  provide  for  him.  Mrs.  Allan  spoke  of  Poe's 
"  ingratitude,  fraud,  and  deceit,"  and,  after  her  husband's  death  at  the 
early  age  of  fifty-two,  she  refused  ever  to  meet  the  poet.  Disparity  in  the 
parties'  age  does  not  justify  Poe's  opposition  to  the  marriage,  for,  while 
Miss  Paterson  was  twenty-five,  Mr.  Allan  at  the  time  was  only  forty-eight. 


IDOLATRY    OF    FAME  171 

Mrs.  Clemm,  his  deceased  father's  sister,  and  with  her 
daughter  Virginia,  whom  he  afterward  married.  With 
the  cutting  off  of  his  annuity  his  circumstances  became 
greatly  straitened,  and  his  frequent  lapses  into  intem- 
perance made  his  life  wretched.  Only  the  industry  and 
affection  of  his  aunt  carried  him  through  the  resulting 
sicknesses  and  despondencies.  But  the  winning  of  a 
prize  of  one  hundred  dollars  by  his  tale  of  "  A  Manu- 
script Found  in  a  Bottle  "  rescued  him  from  trouble, 
and  gave  him  hope  for  the  future. 

Poe  was  a  man  fiercely  possessed  by  the  desire  for 
fame.  "I  love  fame;  I  dote  on  it;  I  idolize  it,"  he 
wrote.  He  aimed,  to  use  his  own  words,  "  to  kick  up 
a  bobbery."  "  I  am  young,  not  yet  20,  am  a  poet, 
if  deep  worship  of  all  beauty  can  make  me  one,  and 
wish  to  be  so,  in  the  more  common  meaning  of  the 
word.  I  would  give  the  world  to  embody  half  the 
ideal  afloat  in  my  imagination."  So  early  as  his  four- 
teenth year  he  had  written  verses,  and  in  1827,  before 
enlisting  in  the  army  in  Boston,  he  published  a  little 
book  entitled  "  Tamerlane  and  Other  Poems."  "  Tam- 
erlane "  is  the  story,  in  verse,  of  a  shepherd's  son  who, 
under  the  spur  of  an  inordinate  ambition,  leaves  his 
betrothed,  without  explaining  his  purpose,  and  under  a 
feigned  name  seeks  to  win  for  her  a  throne.  He  suc- 
ceeds ;  but  when  he  returns  to  lay  the  crown  at  her  feet, 
he  finds  that,  in  his  absence  and  apparent  desertion, 
she  has  died  of  grief.  In  this  story  of  the  Emperor  of 
Samarcand,  Poe  found  expression  for  some  features 
of  his  own  biography.  He  was  just  about  to  become  a 
soldier,  and  under  a  feigned  name.  He  was  conscious 
of  great  literary  powers,  and  he  fancied  that  he  could 


1^2  "  TAMERLANE  " 

make  the  whole  world  sing-  his  praises.  He  was  an 
exile  from  home,  and  had  already  lost  a  friend  most 
dear  to  him.  The  shadows  of  a  settled  melancholy 
were  gathering  about  him.  Death  and  the  sepulcher 
loomed  up  in  the  distance.  And  the  youthful  poet 
has  no  refuge  or  comforter  but  pride: 

The  passionate  spirit  which  hath  known, 
And  deeply  felt  the  silent  tone 
Of  its  own  self-supremacy — 


The  soul  which  feels  its  innate  right — 

The  mystic  empire  and  high  power 

Given  by  the  energetic  might 

Of  Genius,  at  its  natal  hour; 

Which  knows  (believe  me  at  this  time, 

When  falsehood  were  a  tenfold  crime, 

There  is  a  power  in  the  high  spirit 

To  know  the  fate  it  will  inherit) 

The  soul,  which  knows  such  power,  will  still 

Find  Pride  the  ruler  of  its  will. 

And  pride  brings  only  despair  and  a  broken  heart. 
This  earliest  of  Poe's  verses  seems  now  a  prophecy  of 
his  end : 

I  reach'd  my  home — my  home  no  more — • 
For  all  was  flown  that  made  it  so — 
I  pass'd  from  out  its  mossy  door, 
In  vacant  idleness  of  woe. 
There  met  me  on  its  threshold  stone 
A  mountain  hunter,  I  had  known 
In  childhood,  but  he  knew  me  not. 
Something  he  spoke  of  the  old  cot: 
It  had  seen  better  days,  he  said; 
There  rose  a  fountain  once,  and  there 
Full  many  a  fair  flower  raised  its  head: 
But  she  who  rear'd  them  was  long  dead, 


"  AL    AARAAF  "  173 

And  in  such  follies  had  no  part, 
What  was  there  left  me  now?  despair — 
A  kingdom  for  a  broken — heart. 

The  second  of  these  youthful  poems  demands  no- 
tice, not  only  because  it  is  his  longest  piece  of  verse,  but 
also  because  it  represents  the  imagination  and  trans- 
cendental style  of  his  thinking.  "  Al  Aaraaf,"  as  he 
himself  says,  is  a  star  discovered  by  Tycho  Brahe,  which 
appeared  suddenly  in  the  heavens,  attained,  in  a  few 
days,  a  brilliancy  surpassing  that  of  Jupiter,  then  as 
suddenly  disappeared,  and  has  never  since  been  seen. 
He  makes  this  star  the  abode  of  all  the  loveliness  that 
perishes  on  earth.  In  a  melodious  rhapsody  as  dis- 
jointed as  a  dream,  he  celebrates  the  beauty  of  a  world 
which  earth's  sorrows  have  never  entered,  and  where 
no  moral  restraints  hinder  the  activity  of  its  denizens. 
Nesace,  who  seems  the  personified  spirit  of  this  ideal 
realm,  summons  her  lover  to  join  her  there : 

"  Leave  tenantless  thy  crystal  home,  and  fly, 
With  all  thy  train,  athwart  the  moony  sky, 
Apart — like  fireflies  in  Sicilian  night, 
And  wing  to  other  worlds  another  light! 
Divulge  the  secrets  of  thy  embassy 
To  the  proud  orbs  that  twinkle,  and  so  be 
To  every  heart  a  barrier  and  a  ban 
Lest  the  stars  totter  in  the  guilt  of  man!  " 

We  might  well  doubt  whether  this  invocation  had  any 
definite  meaning,  if  it  were  not  for  the  partial  explana- 
tion, in  Part  II,  with  regard  to  the  ultimate  destiny  of 
the  lovers : 

For  what  (to  them)  availeth  it  to  know 

That  Truth  is  Falsehood,  or  that  Bliss  is  Woe? 

Sweet  was  their  death — with  them  to  die  was  rife 


174     "THE  ARABESQUE  AND  THE  GROTESQUE" 

With  the  last  ecstasy  of  satiate  life; 
Beyond  that  death  no  immortality, 
But  sleep  that  pondereth  and  is  not  "  to  be;  " 
And  there,  oh,  may  my  weary  spirit  dwell, 
Apart  from  Heaven's  Eternity — and  yet  how  far 
from  Hell! 

What  guilty  spirit,  in  what  shrubbery  dim, 
Heard  not  the  stirring  summons  of  that  hymn? 
But  two;  they  fell;  for  Heaven  no  grace  imparts 
To  those  who  hear  not  for  their  beating  hearts; 
A  maiden-angel  and  her  seraph-lover. 
Oh,  where  (and  ye  may  seek  the  wide  skies  over) 
Was  Love,  the  blind,  near  sober  Duty  known? 
Unguided  Love  hath  fallen  'mid  "  tears  of  perfect 
moan." 

The  lesson  of  the  poem  is  manifestly  this,  that  the 
delights  of  love  are  to  be  sought  even  at  the  price  of 
annihilation.  But  I  must  leave  the  theology  of  "  Al 
Aaraaf  "  for  later  exposition,  and  content  myself  now 
with  pointing  out  that  this  juvenile  poetry,  though  in- 
stinct with  imagination  and  melody,  was  greatly  lack- 
ing in  unity  and  rationality.  These  latter  merits  came 
to  Poe  after  years  of  experiment,  and  as  the  result 
of  writing  and  reflection  in  other  lines.  Poetry  with 
him  was  an  occasional  and  a  rare  product — to  use  his 
own  words,  "  a  passion,  and  not  a  purpose."  The  quan- 
tity of  it  was  exceedingly  small.  He  wrote  exceedingly 
little,  but  gave  endless  emendation  and  polish  to  his 
work.  In  his  day  poetry  was  not  a  selling  commodity ; 
the  poet  was  forced  to  earn  his  living ;  magazine  litera- 
ture alone  furnished  him  a  support.  His  imagination 
made  his  first  successful  work  to  be  "  Tales  of  the  Ara- 
besque and  the  Grotesque."  He  was  the  forerunner  of 
Conan  Doyle  in  his  detective  stories.  The  mystery  and 


TALES    OF    THE    CHARNEL-HOUSE  17$ 

ingenuity  of  "  The  Gold  Bug  "  and  "  The  Murders  of 
the  Rue  Morgue  "  are  distinctly  new  features  of  liter- 
ary romance.  We  cannot  too  highly  praise  the  artistic 
skill  with  which  the  elements  of  his  plots  are  mar- 
shaled, and  every  stroke  is  made  to  lead  to  the  sudden 
and  startling  conclusion.  But  little  by  little  Poe  came 
to  think  that  to  startle  was  to  succeed.  His  romance 
had  not  the  realistic  basis  of  Swift  and  Defoe.  The 
bizarre,  the  gruesome,  the  loathsome,  the  fiendish, 
occupied  his  thoughts  and  became  the  subjects  of  his 
pen.  He  aims  to  make  our  flesh  creep.  He  appeals 
exclusively  to  the  nerves.  Burial  alive,  epileptic  fits, 
the  mesmerism  of  a  dying  man,  the  possession  of  one 
soul  by  that  of  another  who  has  departed,  somnam- 
bulism, metapsychosis,  the  gouging  out  of  eyes,  suicide- 
compacts,  ghosts,  tombs,  endless  sorrow  and  despair — 
these  have  never  been  more  fearfully  portrayed  than 
by  Edgar  Allan  Poe.  "  His  realm,"  says  Griswold, 
"  was  on  the  shadowy  confines  of  human  experience, 
among  the  abodes  of  crime,  gloom,  and  horror,  and 
there  he  delighted  to  surround  himself  with  images  of 
beauty  and  of  terror,  to  raise  his  solemn  palaces  and 
towers  and  spires  in  a  night  upon  which  should  rise 
no  sun."  In  all  this  he  depicted  the  lashings  of  his 
own  conscience,  his  utter  lack  of  faith  in  God  and  in  a 
life  beyond  the  grave,  his  horror  in  view  of  the  death 
to  which  his  lost  soul  was  hastening,  and  the  unspeak- 
able misery  and  gloom  of  a  sinner  without  Christ  and 
without  hope.  There  is  a  somber  splendor  about  "  The 
Fall  of  the  House  of  Usher,"  and  a  melancholy  sweet- 
ness about  "  Ligeia  " ;  but  Poe's  tales  are  tales  of  the 
charnel-house,  and  their  odor  of  decay  is  quite  foreign 


1^6  POE    AS    EDITOR   AND    CRITIC 

to  the  beauty  which  he  held  to  be  the  end  and  aim  of 
perfect  art 

Poetry  had  a  rival  not  only  in  Poe's  tales,  but  also 
in  Poe's  criticism.  From  being  a  contributor  to  maga- 
zines he  became  an  editor.  Instead  of  writing  stories 
of  his  own,  he  came  to  criticize  the  work  of  others. 
He  passed  successively  in  review  all  the  prominent 
authors  of  his  day,  whether  American  or  English. 
Much  of  our  literature  had  been  characterized  by  dull 
mediocrity,  and  this  dull  mediocrity  had  been  praised. 
Poe  subjected  this  dull  work  to  trenchant  criticism. 
His  insight  was  keen,  he  had  correct  principles  of  judg- 
ment, and  he  had  little  mercy  for  those  who  failed  to 
satisfy  his  tests.  We  owe  him  a  great  debt,  for  he 
was  our  first  American  critic.  But  he  was  too  exclu- 
sively censorious.  He  wielded  the  broadax  rather 
than  the  rapier.  His  magazine  motto  seemed  to  be, 
"  Hang,  draw,  and  quarter,"  it  has  been  wittily  said. 
His  exposure  of  pretense  and  ridicule  of  error  made 
him  many  enemies.  He  aimed  to  startle  even  here. 
His  criticisms  commanded  attention  indeed.  Within 
a  few  months  he  increased  the  circulation  of  a  maga- 
zine from  five  to  forty-five  thousand.  But  there  was 
an  ill  temper  and  arrogance  in  his  writing  which  re- 
sulted from  disordered  habits.  His  tale,  "  The  Imp 
of  the  Perverse,"  well  describes  his  own  mental  and 
moral  unsoundness.  His  treatment  of  Longfellow  can 
hardly  be  explained  except  as  an  ebullition  of  envy  and 
malice.  He  prefaced  his  review  of  "  The  Voices  of 
the  Night "  with  the  acrimonious  title,  "  Mr.  Long- 
fellow, and  other  Plagiarists  " ;  and  he  characterized 
the  poet's  "  Midnight  Mass  for  the  Dying  Year  "  as 


ALIENATION    OF    FRIENDS  177 

belonging  "  to  the  most  barbarous  class  of  literary  rob- 
bery." Longfellow  generously  replied,  "  The  harsh- 
ness of  his  criticisms  I  have  never  attributed  to  any- 
thing but  the  irritation  of  a  sensitive  nature,  chafed 
by  some  indefinite  sense  of  wrong."  Those  who  stood 
nearer  to  Poe  could  not  form  so  charitable  a  judgment. 
Griswold,  Willis,  and  Lowell  bore  with  him,  but  he 
attacked  them  all,  until  forbearance  was  no  longer  a 
virtue.  Hawthorne,  he  thought,  had  stolen  directly 
from  passages  in  "  William  Wilson."  "  Mr.  Bryant 
is  not  all  a  fool.  Mr.  Willis  is  not  quite  an  ass.  Car- 
lyle  is  an  ass,  and  Emerson  is  his  imitator."  He  calls 
Miss  Fuller  "  that  detestable  old  maid."  Lowell  is 
"  a  ranting  abolitionist,  a  fanatic  for  the  mere  love 
of  fanaticism."  Lowell  replied  that  Poe  sometimes 
mistook  his  vial  of  prussic  acid  for  his  inkstand.  His 
colleagues  could  not  forever  endure  his  whims  and  his 
abuse.  One  connection  after  another  was  broken ;  one 
friend  after  another  was  alienated.  Brilliant  promise 
was  succeeded  by  pitiful  failure.  Riotous  intemperance 
ruined  his  prospects  even  after  long  periods  of  ab- 
stinence. The  use  of  opium  was  added  to  indulgence 
in  drink,  and  under  the  influence  of  these  stimulants 
Poe  was  a  madman. 

The  story  of  his  marriage  and  of  the  illness  and 
death  of  his  young  and  beautiful  wife  is  most  pathetic. 
Virginia  was  the  child  of  Mrs.  Clemm,  the  aunt  who 
toiled  for  him  and  sheltered  him  through  all  his 
escapades  and  illnesses.  His  tale  "  Eleonora  "  is  auto- 
biographical. It  tells  the  story  of  a  romantic  love, 
which  seems  at  first  to  have  been  illicit.  A  license  was 
issued  in  September,  1835,  but  there  is  no  record  of 


1^8  "  ANNABEL   LEE  " 

marriage  following  until  May,  1836.  Then  a  public 
marriage  took  place,  when  Virginia  was  hardly  four- 
teen, though  a  relative  satisfied  the  legal  requirement 
by  testifying  that  she  was  twenty-two.  Her  married 
life  lasted  for  twelve  troubled  years.  A  friend  de- 
scribes the  scene  as  she  neared  her  end :  "  There  was 
no  clothing  on  the  bed,  which  was  only  straw,  but  a 
white  counterpane  and  sheets.  The  weather  was  cold, 
and  the  sick  lady  had  the  dreadful  chills  that  accom- 
pany the  hectic  fever  of  consumption.  She  lay  on  the 
straw  bed,  wrapped  in  her  husband's  great  coat,  with 
a  large  tortoise-shell  cat  on  her  bosom.  The  wonder- 
ful cat  seemed  conscious  of  her  great  usefulness.  The 
coat  and  the  cat  were  the  sufferer's  only  means  of 
warmth,  except  as  her  husband  held  her  hands,  and 
her  mother  her  feet."  In  1847  she  died,  and  the  poet 
wrote  his  memorial  of  her  in  "  Annabel  Lee  " : 

It  was  many  and  many  a  year  ago, 

In  a  kingdom  by  the  sea, 
That  a  maiden  lived  whom  you  may  know 

By  the  name  of  Annabel  Lee; 
And  this  maiden  she  lived  with  no  other  thought 

Than  to  love  and  be  loved  by  me. 

I  was  a  child  and  she  was  a  child, 

In  this  kingdom  by  the  sea, 
But  we  loved  with  a  love  that  was  more  than  love, 

I  and  my  Annabel  Lee; 
With  a  love  that  the  winged  seraphs  of  heaven 

Coveted  her  and  me. 

And  this  was  the  reason  that,  long  ago, 

In  this  kingdom  by  the  sea, 
A  wind  blew  out  of  a  cloud,  chilling 

My  beautiful  Annabel  Lee; 


POE   TO    HIMSELF   A   VICTIM  179 

So  that  her  highborn  kinsmen  came 

And  bore  her  away  from  me, 
To  shut  her  up  in  a  sepulchre 

In  this  kingdom  by  the  sea. 

The  angels,  not  half  so  happy  in  heaven, 

Went  envying  her  and  me; 
Yes!  that  was  the  reason  (as  all  men  know, 

In  this  kingdom  by  the  sea) 
That  the  wind  came  out  of  the  cloud  by  night, 

Chilling  and  killing  my  Annabel  Lee. 

But  our  love  it  was  stronger  by  far  than  the  love 

Of  those  who  were  older  than  we, 

Of  many  far  wiser  than  we; 
And  neither  the  angels  in  heaven  above, 

Nor  the  demons  down  under  the  sea, 
Can  ever  dissever  my  soul  from  the  soul 

Of  the  beautiful  Annabel  Lee: 

For  the  moon  never  beams,  without  bringing  me 
dreams 

Of  the  beautiful  Annabel  Lee; 
And  the  stars  never  rise,  but  I  feel  the  bright  eyes 

Of  the  beautiful  Annabel  Lee; 
And  so,  all  the  night-tide,  I  lie  down  by  the  side 
Of  my  darling — my  darling — my  life  and  my  bride, 

In  the  sepulchre  there  by  the  sea, 

In  her  tomb  by  the  sounding  sea. 

This  is  real  poetry,  and  it  expresses  at  least  occa- 
sional and  temporary  emotion.  But  it  is  certain  that 
Poe  made  love  to  other  women  during  the  lifetime  of 
his  wife.  And  though  he  clung  to  her  for  sympathy 
and  pity,  he  plunged  her  into  poverty  and  distress. 
He  regarded  himself  as  a  victim,  however,  rather  than 
as  a  criminal,  and  I  quote  from  one  of  his  letters  his 
own  self- justification : 


l8o  "  WHIM,    IMPULSE,    PASSION  " 

I  can  do  no  more  than  hint.  This  "  evil  "  was  the  great- 
est that  can  befall  a  man.  Six  years  ago,  a  wife,  whom  I 
loved  as  no  man  ever  loved  before,  ruptured  a  blood-ves- 
sel in  singing.  Her  life  was  despaired  of.  I  took  leave  of 
her  forever  and  underwent  all  the  agonies  of  her  death.  She 
recovered  partially,  and  I  again  hoped.  At  the  end  of  the 
year  the  vessel  broke  again.  I  went  through  precisely  the 
same  scene.  Then  again — again — and  even  once  again,  at 
varying  intervals.  Each  time  I  felt  all  the  agonies  of  her 
death — and  at  each  accession  of  the  disorder  I  loved  her 
more  dearly  and  clung  to  her  life  with  more  desperate  perti- 
nacity. But  I  am  constitutionally  sensitive — nervous  in  a 
very  unusual  degree — I  became  insane,  with  long  intervals  of 
horrible  sanity.  During  these  fits  of  absolute  unconsciousness 
I  drank — God  only  knows  how  often  or  how  much.  As  a 
matter  of  course  my  enemies  referred  the  insanity  to  the 
drink,  rather  than  the  drink  to  the  insanity. 

To  Lowell  he  wrote :  "  My  life  has  been  whim,  im- 
pulse, passion  " — and  this  is  the  only  explanation  of 
his  career.  In  him  Stevenson's  Doctor  Jekyll  and 
Mr.  Hyde  were  mixed.  He  was  by  turns  industrious 
and  slothful.  One  of  his  friends  touched  the  secret  of 
his  troubles  when  he  told  Poe  that  "  no  man  is  safe 
who  drinks  before  breakfast." 

Whatever  we  may  think  of  Poe's  defense,  drink  and 
opium  were  his  undoing.  His  tales,  his  criticism,  and 
finally  the  poem  of  "  The  Raven  "  gave  him  an  ever- 
increasing  fame,  and  his  connection  with  "  The  Satur- 
day Visitor,"  "  The  Southern  Literary  Messenger," 
"  The  Gentleman's  Magazine,"  "  Graham's  Magazine," 
"  The  Evening  Mirror,"  "  The  Broadway  Journal," 
whether  as  contributor  or  as  editor,  gave  successive 
promise  of  pecuniary  reward.  But  there  was  a  demon 
beside  him  that  always  snatched  the  cup  of  prosperity 
from  his  hand  when  he  was  about  to  drink.  Though 


FOE'S    MISERABLE    DEATH  l8l 

he  made  friends,  one  by  one,  of  Wilmer,  White,  Ken- 
nedy, Tuckerman,  Burton,  Graham,  Greeley — all  of 
them  men  who  sought  to  aid  him — his  ingratitude  and 
rancorous  denunciation  broke  up  every  friendship,  and 
left  him  solitary  and  unhappy.  He  joined  the  Sons  of 
Temperance,  and  broke  his  vows.  He  sought  to  re- 
pair his  fortunes  by  marriage,  and  forfeited  all  claims 
to  his  bride  by  drunkenness  on  the  eve  of  the  intended 
wedding.  He  was  a  physical  and  mental  wreck.  The 
end  came  at  last.  Baltimore,  Philadelphia,  and  New 
York  had  been  places  of  his  temporary  residence.  He 
fled  from  one  to  another,  in  hope  to  escape  the  fiend 
that  pursued  him.  He  left  Richmond  in  October,  1849, 
to  go  North.  But  in  Baltimore  temptation  assailed 
him,  and  he  succumbed.  He  wandered  about  the  city 
for  five  days  in  a  state  of  intoxication.  He  was  foun4 
unconscious,  clad  like  a  beggar  in  soiled  and  tattered 
garments,  in  a  place  of  disreputable  resort,  and  was 
taken  to  a  hospital,  where  for  two  whole  days  he  suf- 
fered the  agonies  of  delirium  tremens,  and  talked  in- 
cessantly to  spectral  and  imaginary  objects  on  the 
walls.  Then  came  two  more  days  of  alternate  violence 
and  of  collapse  from  exhaustion,  in  which  he  cried 
that  his  best  friend  would  be  one  who  would  blow  out 
his  wretched  brains.  At  last,  at  three  o'clock  on  a 
Tuesday  morning,  he  moved  his  head  gently,  uttered 
the  words,  "  Lord,  help  my  poor  soul !  "  and  expired. 
We  have  no  other  record  of  prayer  or  recognition  of 
God's  existence  but  this,  in  all  Poe's  life.  He  used  the 
word  "  God,"  indeed,  in  his  poems,  but  it  was  only  as 
a  conventional  and  rhetorical  accommodation  to  the 
beliefs  of  his  readers.  :He  thought  himself,  and,  as 


l82  POE    AN    ATHEIST    OF    THE    HEART 

nearly  as  it  was  possible  for  any  man  to  be,  he  was, 
an  atheist.  But  are  there  in  this  world  any  real 
atheists  ?  Theoretically,  yes ;  practically,  no.  In  prac- 
tice, all  men  show  by  their  language,  actions,  and  ex- 
pectations that  they  have  the  idea  of  a  Being  above 
them,  upon  whom  they  are  dependent,  who  is  their 
standard  of  truth,  beauty,  and  goodness,  and  who  im- 
poses law  upon  their  moral  natures.  But  in  theory, 
men  may  ignore  or  even  deny  that  they  have  any  idea 
of  such  a  Being,  and  may  believe  such  an  idea  to  be 
self-contradictory  and  irrational.  The  only  way  in 
which  we  can  convince  these  unbelievers  is  by  appeal- 
ing to  their  underlying  convictions,  and  by  showing 
them  that  they  practically  admit  what  they  theoretically 
deny.  Poe's  restlessness  of  soul,  his  tormenting  con- 
science, his  impotence  of  will,  his  frantic  appeals  to 
women  to  rescue  him  from  degradation,  his  dreadful 
fears  of  death  and  the  grave,  were  evidences  that  deep 
down  in  his  heart  was  an  inextinguishable  belief  in  a 
just  God  with  whom  he  was  at  enmity  and  whom  he 
feared  to  meet  in  the  judgment. 

Poe's  atheism  was  an  atheism  of  the  heart,  rather 
than  an  atheism  of  the  head.  He  lacked  the  will  to  be- 
lieve. The  secret  of  professed  atheism  is  really  a  dis- 
like for  the  character  and  the  requirements  of  God. 
Theism  humbles  man's  pride,  implies  his  dependence, 
as  a  creature  and  as  a  sinner.  He  is  willing  to  believe 
in  self;  why  will  he  not  believe  in  God?  "Belief," 
as  Emerson  says,  "  consists  in  accepting  the  affirma- 
tions of  the  soul;  unbelief,  in  rejecting  them."  But 
acceptance  or  rejection  is  determined  by  the  will.  Since 
neither  theism  nor  atheism  can  be  proved,  we  choose 


BLINDED   BY   SELF-CONCEIT  183 

the  alternative  which  we  prefer.  Do  we  wish  a  God  to 
exist  ?  Then  we  may  believe  in  his  existence,  and  our 
faith  will  justify  itself  by  its  results.  We  ask  the 
atheist  to  trust  the  voice  of  his  own  nature,  and  to 
make  experiment  as  to  its  truth.  We  claim  that  this  is 
the  method  of  science.  Science  assumes  nature  and 
her  laws  at  the  start,  but  verification  comes  with  every 
successive  step.  Religion,  in  like  manner,  assumes 
God's  existence  at  the  beginning,  but  each  following 
experience  furnishes  new  evidence  that  the  assumption 
is  correct.  Poe  was  too  proud  to  take  this  childlike  at- 
titude toward  the  truth.  "  My  whole  nature  utterly 
revolts,"  he  exclaimed,  "  at  the  idea  that  there  is  any 
Being  in  the  universe  superior  to  myself!"  And  so 
this  confessed  liar,  slanderer,  gambler,  and  drunkard, 
if  not  also  a  forger  and  a  seducer,  deified  self  and 
turned  his  back  upon  his  only  Lord  and  Redeemer. 
Conceit  of  his  own  powers  and  his  own  worth  so 
blinded  him  that  Infinite  Truth  and  Goodness  made  no 
impression  upon  him.  Self  was  the  only  God  he  be- 
lieved or  served  or  worshiped.  In  this  respect  he  fur- 
nishes, among  all  our  poets,  the  most  perfect  illustra- 
tion of  the  insanity  of  sin.  And  yet  he  did  not  know 
himself  to  be  a  sinner,  for  his  physician  quotes  him  as 
saying :  "  By  the  God  who  reigns  in  heaven,  I  swear  to 
you  that  my  soul  is  incapable  of  dishonor.  I  can  call 
to  mind  no  act  of  my  life  which  would  bring  a  blush  to 
my  cheek." 

It  might  at  first  sight  seem  vain  to  speak  of  such  a 
man's  theology.  But  every  man  has  a  theology.  He 
is  compelled  to  reflect  upon  the  facts  of  the  universe, 
and  upon  his  own  relations  to  the  power  above  him 


184  FOE'S    THEOLOGY    IN    "  EUREKA  " 

upon  which  he  is  dependent.  Even  if  he  is  a  professed 
atheist,  he  is  driven  by  an  accusing  conscience  to  self- 
justification.  He  must  give  a  reason  for  the  very 
unbelief  that  is  in  him.  Poe  has  declared  his  theology 
in  his  prose  poem  entitled  "  Eureka."  He  regarded  it 
as  the  greatest  work  of  his  life,  and  that  by  which  he 
would  be  especially  remembered.  He  thought  it  of 
more  importance  than  Sir  Isaac  Newton's  discovery 
of  gravitation.  It  was  a  materialistic  explanation  of 
the  universe,  its  origin,  development,  and  destiny.  He 
propounded  it  with  amazing  confidence,  and  proposed 
an  edition  of  fifty  thousand  copies  as  a  mere  begin- 
ning. It  was  but  the  shallow  and  half-crazy  dream  of 
a  sciolist  who  had  cribbed  his  slender  basis  of  facts, 
and  from  a  single  primitive  assumption  had  deduced 
a  universe  without  a  God.  It  deserves  no  prolonged 
study,  yet  it  furnishes  such  a  clue  to  his  theory  of 
poetry  that  I  cannot  avoid  a  brief  notice  of  its  doctrine. 
Dreamy  and  unscientific  as  it  is,  it  shows  conclusively 
that  theories  of  the  universe  are  too  often  constructed 
to  excuse  men's  practical  disobedience  to  God.  And 
the  results  of  Poe's  theory  in  his  own  case  show  that, 
instead  of  being  God's  truth,  it  was  a  devil's  lie  to 
ensnare  and  destroy  him.  While  the  assumption  of 
God's  existence  ennobles  and  saves,  the  assumption 
of  a  godless  universe  leads  only  to  intellectual  and 
moral  ruin. 

Poe  was  an  absolute  materialist.  He  regarded  mind 
as  only  an  etherealized  and  sensitive  form  of  matter. 
Body  and  mind  go  hand  in  hand,  and  are  never  sepa- 
rated. Whenever  he  speaks  of  God,  and  of  God's 
volition,  we  must  remember  that  it  is  a  material  God 


AN   ABSOLUTE    MATERIALIST  185 

that  he  has  in  mind,  and  that  the  conception  and  act  of 
such  a  God  are  indistinguishable  from  merely  physical 
instinct.  "  Is  not  God  immaterial?"  he  asks.  He 
replies :  "  There  is  no  immateriality.  That  which  is 
not  matter  is  not  at  all.  .  .  There  are  gradations  of 
matter  of  which  man  knows  nothing  " — and  he  speaks 
of  electricity  as  if  this  answered  to  his  conception  of 
a  material  God.  "  Matter,  unparticled,  indivisible,  one, 
permeating  all  things,  and  impelling  all  things,  this 
matter  is  God.  .  .  Thinking  is  the  motion  of  this  mat- 
ter. .  .  God,  with  all  the  powers  attributed  to  spirit,  is 
but  the  perfection  of  matter."  The  universe  has  origi- 
nated, he  declares,  in  the  creation  by  this  God  of  a 
single  particle  of  matter.  How  a  material  God  was 
capable  of  a  creative  volition  he  does  not  inform  us. 
This  material  particle  had  powers  of  radiation  and  mul- 
tiplication. It  was  diffused  through  a  vast  though 
limited  region  of  space.  The  originating  principle 
acted  continuously  in  each  portion  of  the  matter  into 
which  the  particle  had  become  divided,  and  the  result 
was  the  various  bodies,  molecular  and  molar,  of  the 
great  system.  The  first  element  in  the  universe  then 
was  repulsion ;  and  this  is  nothing  but  mind  or  spirit  in 
expression.  The  original  unity  has  thus  become  mul- 
tiplicity. But  diffusion  and  multiplicity  do  not  of 
themselves  provide  for  progress.  Progress  can  be 
secured  only  by  partial  return  to  unity.  The  original 
diffusive  or  repulsive  force  is  therefore  to  some  extent 
withdrawn,  and  attraction  takes  its  place.  Gravitation 
follows  upon  radiation,  and  attraction  is  body,  as  re- 
pulsion was  mind  or  spirit.  So  we  have  multiplicity 
resulting  in  mind,  and  unity  resulting  in  body.  But  the 


l86  A    SELF-DEIFYING    SCHEME 

return  to  the  unity  must  go  on,  until  all  things  are 
again  resolved  into  the  original  simplicity.  What  was 
originally  one  must  become  one  again.  Separation  of 
intelligences  must  give  place  to  unification  of  intel- 
ligence. As  each  mind  was  only  a  portion  of  the  one 
Being  whom  we  call  God,  so  each  mind  must  be  ab- 
sorbed in  that  One  and  lose  its  separate  identity. 
There  is  no  such  thing  as  personal  immortality.  But 
our  compensation  is  that,  as  we  are  now  only  portions 
of  God,  we  shall  hereafter  take  all  creation  into  union 
with  ourselves,  and  so  shall  ourselves  become  God. 
In  a  note  appended  to  his  own  copy  of  "  Eureka,"  Poe 
wrote: 

The  pain  of  the  consideration  that  we  shall  lose  our  iden- 
tity ceases  at  once  when  we  further  reflect  that  the  process, 
as  above  described,  is  neither  more  nor  less  than  that  of  the 
absorption,  by  each  individual  intelligence,  of  all  other  in- 
telligences (that  is,  of  the  Universe)  into  its  own.  That  God 
may  be  all  in  all,  each  must  become  God. 

This  fantastic  and  self-deifying  scheme  does  not 
end  with  the  present  universe  to  which  we  belong. 
There  are  many  universes,  both  in  space  and  in  time, 
and  there  are  as  many  nature-gods  to  match  them. 
The  tendency  to  unity  belongs  to  all.  But  this  tendency 
is  only  a  blind  physical  impulse  which  is  misnamed 
when  it  is  called  spiritual.  It  presents  to  us  endless 
cycles  of  birth  and  death,  of  growth  and  decay.  It  is 
pantheistic  and  polytheistic  by  turns,  but  it  is  never 
theistic.  Its  so-called  God  has  no  eye  to  pity  and 
no  arm  to  save.  The  beauty  which  it  sees  in  the  uni- 
verse is  only  the  phosphorescent  glow  which  marks  in 
the  darkness  a  mound  of  corruption.  It  gives  no  real 


FOE    CONFESSES   HIS    PHILOSOPHY    FUTILE        187 

explanation  of  the  origin  or  the  progress  of  the  sys- 
tem, since  its  God  is  only  material  force,  without  de- 
signing intelligence  and  without  love  for  his  creatures. 
It  makes  the  universe  a  reaction  upon  will,  instead  of 
being  itself  will.  Human  will  is  mere  illusion;  man  is 
a  victim  instead  of  an  actor ;  and  Poe  deals  with  crime 
against  man,  but  never  with  sin  against  God.  Morality 
becomes  mere  convention.  In  such  a  universe  the  best 
we  can  do  is  to  plod  on,  yielding  to  our  every  impulse 
and  bearing  the  penalty  of  mistakes.  Conscience  re- 
jects such  a  scheme  as  contradicting  our  moral  nature ; 
our  noblest  aspirations  rise  in  rebellion  against  such 
hopeless  subjection  of  the  spirit;  and  Christ's  positive 
revelation  of  life  and  immortality  make  Poe's  seem 
only  a  madman's  dream.  In  fact,  he  confesses  the 
futility  of  his  own  philosophy  when  he  writes :  "  My 
forlorn  and  darkened  nature  is  full  of  forebodings. 
Nothing  cheers  or  comforts  me.  The  future  looks  a 
dreary  blank.  But  I  will  struggle  on  and  hope  against 
hope."  The  dreamer  dwelt  already  in  an  Inferno  like 
that  which  Dante  pictured  in  his  "  Divine  Comedy," 
and  the  horrors  of  which  are  portrayed  by  Michelangelo 
in  his  "  Last  Judgment." 

"  Eureka "  has  been  called  "  a  prevision  of  the 
modern  doctrine  of  evolution."  It  certainly  reminds 
us  of  Herbert  Spencer's  process  from  homogeneity  to 
heterogeneity.  But  it  is  not  original  with  Poe.  It 
merely  reflects  the  nebular  hypothesis  of  Laplace,  and 
the  first  suggestion  of  it  may  have  come  to  Poe  in  his 
childhood.  Whitty,  in  his  Memoir  of  Poe,  tells  us 
that  John  Allan,  Poe's  guardian,  was  a  rather  liberal 
thinker,  and  suggests  that  the  germ  out  of  which  the 


l88  BEAUTY    TO   POE    MERELY    PHYSICAL 

poet's  later  materialism  was  developed  may  have  come 
from  this  source.  "  There  seems  an  autobiographical 
hint  of  this  in  his  tale  '  The  Domain  of  Arnheim,' 
which  he  has  said  contains  '  much  of  his  soul.'  Here 
he  wrote : " 

Some  peculiarities,  either  in  his  early  education,  or  in  the 
nature  of  his  intellect,  had  tinged  with  what  is  termed  ma- 
terialism all  his  ethical  speculations;  and  it  was  this  bias, 
perhaps,  which  led  him  to  believe  that  the  most  advantageous 
at  least,  if  not  the  sole  legitimate  field  for  the  poetic  exercise, 
lies  in  the  creation  of  novel  moods  of  purely  physical  loveli- 
ness. 

It  is  certain  that  Poe's  scheme  of  the  universe  greatly 
influenced  his  ideas  of  poetry  as  well  as  of  life.  He 
was  a  worshiper  of  beauty,  and  in  his  scheme  of  the 
universe  beauty  has  no  relation  to  truth  or  to  good- 
nes"s;  or  rather,  he  would  say,  beauty  is  itself  truth 
and  goodness,  and  there  is  no  truth  or  goodness  be- 
sides. Truth  and  goodness  are  merely  by-products  of 
beauty;  beauty  is  the  standard  by  which  truth  and 
goodness  are  to  be  measured;  beauty  itself  has  no 
standard  of  measurement,  but  is  to  measure  all  things. 
This  is  to  reverse  all  right  rules.  Poe.'s  denial  of  a 
rational  Ordainer  and  Upholder  of  the  universe  renders 
his  judgments  irrational.  Beauty,  like  truth  and  good- 
ness, implies  a  standard  to  which  it  conforms.  There 
must  be  a  God  to  justify  our  sense  of  beauty,  as  well 
as  our  confidence  in  our  mental  processes  and  our  con- 
viction of  moral  obligation.  The  universe  is  a  thought, 
an  ordered  whole,  a  moral  system;  there  must  be  a 
Thinker,  a  Designer,  'a  Lawgiver,  as  the  Author,  Up- 
holder, Ruler,  of  our  mental  and  moral  life.  And  what 


POE'S    ESSENTIALS    OF    POETRY  189 

is  true  in  the  intellectual  and  moral  realm  is  equally 
true  in  the  esthetic  realm.  Beauty  is  conformity  to  a 
standard,  and  that  standard  is  the  eternal  Beauty  in 
God.  But  in  him  it  is  "  the  beauty  of  holiness,"  and 
is  never  separated  from  truth  and  goodness.  Poe 
sought  beauty  apart  from  God — but  such  beauty  ap- 
peals only  to  transitory  and  irrational  emotion ;  it  can- 
not justify  itself  to  reason;  it  is  seductive  and  delusive; 
it  glorifies  the  evil  as  well  as  the  good ;  it  is  pessimistic 
and  degrading ;  it  ceases  to  be  beauty,  by  cutting  loose 
from  the  true  and  the  good,  and  by  making  itself 
supreme. 

Poe  was  "  the  wild  poet  "  who  exemplified  these  false 
principles  of  ethics.  He  claimed  that  the  awakening 
of  emotion  is  the  sole  aim  of  poetry.  Emotion,  he 
would  say,  is  awakened  only  by  beauty;  truth  and 
goodness  are  incidental,  and  never  primary.  There  is 
no  thrill  of  emotion  like  that  of  hopeless  sorrow,  and 
the  death  of  a  loved  and  beautiful  woman  marks  the 
acme  of  human  grief.  Add  now  the  pain  of  parting 
and  the  horror  of  the  tomb;  picture  these  in  verse  of 
penetrating  melody,  and  you  have  the  essentials  of 
poetry.  But  who  does  not  see  that  the  ideal  element 
has  been  lost  ?  True  poetry  presupposes  a  divine  order, 
and  a  worthy  end,  in  the  universe.  There  can  be  no 
great  poetry  without  faith.  Optimism,  and  not  pessi- 
mism, must  be  at  the  heart  of  melody,  or  melody  be- 
comes funereal  and  repulsive.  I  can  best  show  what  I 
mean  by  quoting  the  poem  in  which  Poe's  philosophy 
is  most  vividly  and  perfectly  represented.  The  title  of 
the  poem  is  highly  significant.  It  is  "  The  Conqueror 
Worm." 


196  "  THE    CONQUEROR   WORM  " 

Lo!  't  is  a  gala  night 

Within  the  lonesome  latter  years. 
An  angel  throng,  bewinged,  bedight 

In  veils,  and  drowned  in  tears, 
Sit  in  a  theater  to  see 

A  play  of  hopes  and  fears, 
While  the  orchestra  breathes  fitfully 

The  music  of  the  spheres. 

Mimes,  in  the  form  of  God  on  high, 

Mutter  and  mumble  low, 
And  hither  and  thither  fly; 

Mere  puppets  they,  who  come  and  go 
At  bidding  of  vast  formless  things 

That  shift  the  scenery  to  and  fro, 
Flapping  from  out  their  condor  wings 

Invisible  Woe. 

That  motley  drama — oh,  be  sure 

It  shall  not  be  forgot! 
With  its  Phantom  chased  for  evermore 

By  a  crowd  that  seize  it  not, 
Through  a  circle  that  ever  returneth  in 

To  the  self-same  spot; 
And  much  of  Madness,  and  more  of  Sin, 

And  Horror  the  soul  of  the  plot. 

But  see  amid  the  mimic  rout 

A  crawling  shape  intrude: 
A  blood-red  thing  that  writhes  from  out 

The  scenic  solitude! 
It  writhes — it  writhes! — with  mortal  pangs 

The  mimes  become  its  food, 
And  seraphs  sob  at  vermin  fangs 

In  human  gore  imbued. 

Out — out  are  the  lights — out  all! 

And  over  each  quivering  form 
The  curtain,  a  funeral  pall, 

Comes  down  with  the  rush  of  a  storm, 


AN    IMAGINATION    FED    ON    THE    ABNORMAL      IQI 

While  the  angels,  all  pallid  and  wan, 

Uprising,  unveiling,  affirm 
That  the  play  is  the  tragedy,  "  Man," 

And  its  hero,  the  Conqueror  Worm. 

Here  is  melody  and  the  thrill  of  emotion,  but  all  in 
the  interest  of  a  godless  universe  and  a  hopeless  hu- 
manity. Here  is  imagination,  but  only  of  the  bizarre 
and  the  gruesome.  The  unbelieving  poet  can  con- 
struct only  a  universe  of  sorrow  and  of  death.  Death 
indeed  is  the  annihilation  of  personal  and  conscious 
existence,  and  is  the  only  hope  of  mortals.  In  his 
poem  "  For  Annie  "  he  writes  : 

Thank  Heaven!  the  crisis, 

The  danger,  is  past, 
And  the  lingering  illness 

Is  over  at  last, 
And  the  fever  called  "Living" 

Is  conquered  at  last. 

Man  is  "  a  puppet,  cast  in  the  form  of  God,"  and 
conquered  by  the  "  Conqueror  Worm." 

Foe's  imagination  had  only  limited  range.  His 
moral  nature  was  too  self-centered  to  give  him  any 
proper  view  of  human  life  or  destiny.  He  reveled  in 
the  abnormal  and  revolting  incidents  of  our  existence. 
The  grim,  the  weird,  the  spectral,  the  terrible,  im- 
pressed him  most.  These  left  his  appetite  for  beauty 
unsatisfied ;  and  his  best  poetry  is  the  expression  of 
disappointed  hopes  and  of  everlasting  regrets.  There 
are  three  essays  which  will  live  when  his  "  Eureka  " 
is  forgotten — essays  in  which  he  exhibits  unusual 
powers  of  analysis  and  sanity  of  judgment,  and  which 
notwithstanding  reveal  the  shortcomings  of  his  art. 


192  POE's    "  POETIC    PRINCIPLE  " 

The  first  is  entitled  "  The  Poetic  Principle."  Poetry, 
he  maintains,  is  the  result  of  man's  struggle  to  appre- 
hend the  supernal  Loveliness  and  to  penetrate  into  the 
mystery  that  surrounds  us.  It  is  the  rhythmical  crea- 
tion of  Beauty.  Its  object  is  the  pleasurable  excite- 
ment of  the  soul  by  our  recombination  of  the  images 
found  in  nature.  But,  since  human  effort  always  fails 
to  realize  the  ideal  after  which  it  strives,  there  must  in 
all  true  poetry  be  an  element  of  sorrow.  A  "  certain 
taint  of  sadness  is  inseparably  connected  with  all  the 
higher  manifestations  of  true  Beauty."  Since  poetry 
aims  to  rouse  and  to  elevate  the  emotions,  it  is  "  inde- 
pendent of  that  Truth  which  is  the  satisfaction  of  the 
Reason."  The  didactic  and  the  moral  are  foreign  to 
the  realm  of  poetry.  It  is  more  nearly  allied  to  music 
than  to  any  other  art.  Poe  was  not  a  musician,  like 
Lanier;  and  Lanier  improved  upon  Poe's  theory.  But 
Poe  exemplifies  his  own  doctrine  by  verse  so  dainty 
and  sweet,  that  it  enchains  our  attention  and  persuades 
us  against  our  wills.  He  dealt  in  "  the  witchery  of 
words."  He  caught  from  Negro  minstrelsy  the  tell- 
ing effect  of  the  refrain.  His  finished  poems  were 
works  of  endless  elaboration,  in  which  every  stroke  is 
effective,  and  the  whole  product  tends  from  the  begin- 
ning to  a  predestined  end.  His  poem  "  The  Bells  " 
shows  him,  at  his  best,  as  the  melodist  and  literary 
artist : 

Hear  the  sledges  with  the  bells, 

Silver  bells! 

What  a  world  of  merriment  their  melody  foretells! 
How  they  tinkle,  tinkle,  tinkle, 

In  the  icy  air  of  night! 
While  the  stars,  that  oversprinkle 


"  THE    BELLS  "  193 

All  the  heavens,  seem  to  twinkle 

With  a  crystalline  delight; 
Keeping  time,  time,  time, 
In  a  sort  of  Runic  rhyme, 

To  the  tintinnabulation  that  so  musically  wells 
From  the  bells,  bells,  bells,  bells, 

Bells,  bells,  bells,— 
From  the  jingling  and  the  tinkling  of  the  bells. 

Then  we  hear  "  the  mellow  wedding-bells."  But  these 
are  followed  by  "  the  loud  alarum  bells  " : 

In  the  startled  ear  of  night 
How  they  scream  out  their  affright! 
Too  much  horrified  to  speak, 
They  can  only  shriek,  shriek, 

Out  of  tune, 

In  a  clamorous  appealing  to  the  mercy  of  the  fire, 
In  a  mad  expostulation  with  the  deaf  and  frantic  fire, 

Oh,  the  bells,  bells,  bells! 
What  a  tale  their  terror  tells 

Of  Despair! 

How  they  clang,  and  clash,  and  roar! 
What  a  horror  they  outpour 
On  the  bosom  of  the  palpitating  air! 

And  finally  come  the  funeral  bells.  Here  Poe  is  at 
home,  for  beyond  death  he  has  no  vision  of  Him  who 
is  the  Resurrection  and  the  Life : 

Hear  the  tolling  of  the  bells, 

Iron  bells! 

What  a  world  of  solemn  thought  their  monody  compels! 
In  the  silence  of  the  night 
How  we  shiver  with  affright 
At  the  melancholy  menace  of  their  tone! 
For  every  sound  that  floats 
From  the  rust  within  their  throats 
Is  a  groan. 


194  "  THE    PHILOSOPHY    OF    COMPOSITION  " 

And  the  people — ah,  the  people, 
They  that  dwell  up  in  the  steeple, 

All  alone, 
And  who  tolling,  tolling,  tolling 

In  that  muffled  monotone, 
Feel  a  glory  in  so  rolling 

On  the  human  heart  a  stone — 
They  are  neither  man  nor  woman, 
They  are  neither  brute  nor  human, 

They  are  Ghouls: 
And  their  king  it  is  who  tolls; 
And  he  rolls,  rolls,  rolls, 

Rolls 

A  psean  from  the  bells; 
And  his  merry  bosom  swells 

With  the  paean  of  the  bells, 
And  he  dances,  and  he  yells: 
Keeping  time,  time,  time, 
In  a  sort  of  Runic  rhyme, 

To  the  moaning  and  the  groaning  of  the  bells. 

The  second  of  Poe's  didactic  essays  has  for  its  sub- 
ject "  The  Philosophy  of  Composition."  I  regard  this 
as  one  of  the  most  thoughtful  and  instructive  papers 
ever  written  by  an  American.  It  may  well  be  set  side 
by  side  with  Herbert  Spencer's  essay  on  style,  in  which 
he  propounds  the  principle  that  its  greatest  essential  is 
economy  of  the  reader's  or  hearer's  attention — the 
more  energy  is  expended  upon  the  form,  the  less  there 
remains  to  grapple  with  the  substance.  Poe  declares 
that  every  work  of  literary  art  must  be  written  back- 
ward; the  writer  must  first  know  his  terminus  ad 
quern;  analysis  must  come  before  synthesis;  the  essay 
must  be  a  gradual  approach  to  a  conclusion  perfectly 
defined  in  the  author's  mind,  but  only  by  successive 
steps  made  known  to  the  reader.  The  element  of 


POE  S    THEORY    IN        THE    RAVEN  195 

surprise  is  necessary  to  success;  attention  must  be 
gained,  and  kept,  till  the  denouement  caps  the  climax 
and  satisfies  the  mind.  Here  is  a  principle  of  universal 
application,  and  writers  of  note  do  consciously  or  un- 
consciously observe  it.  Poe  does  us  a  great  service  by 
illustrating  the  principle  in  his  composition  of  "  The 
Raven."  I  dismiss,  as  already  considered,  his  theory 
that  melancholy  is  the  noblest  and  most  legitimate 
of  the  poetical  tones :  that  is  only  his  inference  from  a 
godless  and  hopeless  universe.  I  dismiss  also  his  view 
that  the  true  poem  must  always  be  a  brief  one,  f OP  this 
view  re^ts  upon  the  premise  that  poetry  appeals,  never 
to  reason,  but  only  to  fleeting  emotion:  the  epic  may 
satisfy  our  minds,  not  only  by  its  successive  scenes,  but 
by  the  unity  of  their  sequence  and  development.  And 
finally  I  dismiss  his  doctrine  of  the  refrain,  as  unques- 
tionably possessing  originality  and  value.  I  call  at- 
tention only  to  the  fact  that  the  last  word  of  the  poem 
is  the  first  in  the  poet's  mind  as  he  begins  to  construct 
his  work.  And  that  word  is  "  Nevermore." 

The  subject  of  the  poem  is  hopeless  sorrow,  and  the 
word  "  nevermore  "  expresses  it.  But  that  word  must 
have  a  speaker.  Who  feels  such  sorrow  more  than  the 
lover,  the  object  of  whose  affection  has  been  snatched 
from  his  side?  What  shall  be  the  locality  of  his  grief? 
It  must  be  the  solitude  of  his  study.  How  can  "  Never- 
more "  be  uttered  in  an  endless  monotone?  Only 
a  non-reasoning  being  is  capable  of  such  heartless  re- 
iteration. The  parrot  is  the  flippant  bird  of  day ;  only 
the  raven  is  the  speaking  bird  of  night.  How  shall  the 
lover  and  the  raven  be  brought  together?  There  must 
be  a  tempestuous  night,  and  the  flapping  of  the  raven's 


196  "  THE    RAVEN  " 

wings  seems  to  be  a  knocking  at  the  door.  The  open- 
ing of  the  door  admits  the  sable  visitor.  The  raven 
enters  to  find  refuge  from  the  storm,  and  perches  upon 
the  bust  of  Pallas  over  the  chamber  door.  The  lover 
begins  by  jesting  at  the  strange  apparition,  and  by  ask- 
ing questions.  But  soon  he  is  mystified  and  solemnized. 
To  all  his  successive  inquiries  the  bird  makes  but  one 
reply:  it  is  the  ominous  "Nevermore."  And  the  re- 
sult is  only  the  deepening  of  the  mystery  and  the  sor- 
row of  death.  As  a  lesson  in  literary  workmanship, 
this  poem  is  unique  and  invaluable,  and  that  without 
our  deciding  how  far  in  Poe's  case  the  process  of  com- 
position was  conscious  or  unconscious.  "  The  Raven  " 
is  his  masterpiece,  and,  as  uniting  his  melody  and 
his  melancholy,  it  may  be  regarded  as  one  of  the  great 
works  of  American  literature — a  work  as  wonderful 
and  as  perfect  as  Gray's  "  Elegy  in  a  Country  Church- 
yard." For  that  reason,  I  may  be  permitted  to  quote 
from  it  several  of  its  most  significant  stanzas : 

Once  upon  a  midnight  dreary,  while  I  pondered,  weak  and 
weary, 

Over  many  a  quaint  and  curious  volume  of  forgotten  lore, — 

While  I  nodded,  nearly  napping,  suddenly  there  came  a  tap- 
ping, 

As  of  some  one  gently  rapping,  rapping  at  my  chamber  door. 

"  'T  is  some  visitor,"  I  muttered,  "  tapping  at  my  chamber 
door: 

Only  this,  and  nothing  more." 


Open  here  I  flung  the  shutter,  when,  with  many  a  flirt  and 

flutter, 

In  there  stepped  a  stately  Raven  of  the  saintly  days  of  yore. 
Not  the  least  obeisance  made  he;  not  a  minute  stopped  or 

stayed  he; 


"  THE   RAVEN  "  197 

But,  with  mien  of  lord  or  lady,  perched  above  my  chamber 

door, 

Perched  upon  a  bust  of  Pallas  just  above  my  chamber  door: 
Perched,  and  sat,  and  nothing  more. 

Then  this  ebony  bird  beguiling  my  sad  fancy  into  smiling 
By  the  grave  and  stern  decorum  of  the  countenance  it  wore, — 
"  Though  thy  crest  be  shorn  and  shaven,  thou,"  I  said,  "  art 

sure  no  craven, 
Ghastly  grim  and  ancient  Raven  wandering  from  the  Nightly 

shore: 
Tell  me  what  thy  lordly  name  is  on  the  Night's  Plutonian 

shore!  " 

Quoth  the  Raven,  "  Nevermore." 

"  Prophet!  "  said  I,  "  thing  of  evil!  prophet  still,  if  bird  or 

devil! 
Whether  Tempter  sent,  or  whether  tempest  tossed  thee  here 

ashore, 

Desolate  yet  all  undaunted,  on  this  desert  land  enchanted — 
On  this  home  by  Horror  haunted — tell  me  truly,  I  implore: 
Is  there — is  there  balm  in  Gilead? — tell  me — tell  me,  I 

implore!  " 

Quoth  the  Raven,  "  Nevermore." 

"Prophet!"  said  I,  "thing  of  evil — prophet  still,  if  bird  or 

devil! 
By  that  Heaven  that  bends  above  us,  by  that  God  we  both 

adore, 
Tell  this  soul  with  sorrow  laden  if,  within  the  distant 

Aidenn, 
It  shall  clasp  a  sainted  maiden  whom  the  angels  name 

Lenore: 
Clasp  a  rare  and  radiant  maiden  whom  the  angels  name 

Lenore! " 

Quoth  the  Raven,  "  Nevermore." 

"  Be  that  word  our  sign  of  parting,  bird  or  fiend! "  I  shrieked, 

upstarting: 
"  Get  thee  back  into  the  tempest  and  the  Night's  Plutonian 

shore! 


198  POE    A    MASTER   OF    TECHNIQUE 

Leave  no  black  plume  as  a  token  of  that  lie  thy  soul  hath 

spoken! 

Leave  my  loneliness  unbroken!  quit  the  bust  above  my  door! 
Take  thy  beak  from  out  my  heart,  and  take  thy  form  from  off 

my  door! " 

Quoth  the  Raven,  "  Nevermore." 

And  the  Raven,  never  flitting,  still  is  sitting,  still  is  sitting, 

On  the  pallid  bust  of  Pallas  just  above  my  chamber  door; 

And  his  eyes  have  all  the  seeming  of  a  demon's  that  is  dream- 
ing, 

And  the  lamp-light  o'er  him  streaming  throws  his  shadow  on 
the  floor: 

And  my  soul  from  out  that  shadow  that  lies  floating  on  the 
floor 

Shall  be  lifted — nevermore! 


Here  is  mastery  of  the  technique  of  verse,  and  a 
musical  refrain,  the  impression  of  which  deepens  to  the 
very  end.  But  there  is  also  a  gathering  gloom  that 
chills  and  affrights.  Is  this  the  noblest  poetry?  Not 
unless  it  most  truly  represents  life.  Such  predeter- 
mined sadness  is  irrational,  for  hopeless  sorrow  denies 
the  reality  of  a  divine  providence  and  gives  the  lie  to 
God's  word.  It  declares  that  there  is  no  "  balm  in 
Gilead,"  and  that  Christ  has  died  in  vain.  Poe  was 
as  much  a  pagan,  as  if  he  had  never  heard  of  the  Cross. 
He  sorrowed  as  those  without  hope.  He  did  not 
see  that  "  the  last  enemy  that  shall  be  abolished  is 
death,"  and  that  our  God  and  Saviour  has  made  death 
to  be  the  gateway  to  eternal  life.  Poe's  poetry  is 
therefore  as  unmoral  and  misleading  as  if  written  in 
the  interests  of  vice.  It  tempts  men,  by  reaction,  to 
say,  "  Let  us  eat  and  drink,  for  to-morrow  we  die." 
I  acquit  our  poet  of  any  conscious  pandering  to  im- 
morality. If  there  is  any  condoning  or  glorifying  of 


THE    RATIONALE   OF   VERSE  199 

illicit  passion,  it  is  veiled  and  unintentional.  But  to 
remove  all  hope  from  humanity  is  to  doom  it  to  death. 
Despair  leads  men  into  sin  as  often  as  does  the  desire 
for  pleasure.  And  I  must  regard  the  quenching  of  the 
light  of  hope  as  a  vicious  element  in  Poe's  poetry. 

"  The  Rationale  of  Verse  "  is  a  third  essay  in  which 
our  poet  attempts  a  scientific  exposition  of  rhythm, 
rhyme,  meter,  and  versification.  Here  too,  he  has 
shown  his  best  powers,  and  has  done  great  service  to 
his  art.  His  account  of  the  genesis  of  prosody  is  novel 
and  interesting.  He  holds  that  the  rudiment  of  verse 
is  found  in  the  spondee — equality  of  sound  in  two 
accented  syllables.  Then  the  perception  of  monotone 
gives  rise  to  an  attempt  at  its  relief :  the  iambus  and 
the  trochee  are  results.  Dactylic  and  anapaestic  words 
naturally  follow ;  and  then  the  line,  which  first  curtails 
and  then  defines  the  length  of  a  sequence.  If  lines  are 
to  be  defined  to  the  ear,  equality  in  sound  of  the  final 
syllables  is  needed,  and  hence  arises  rhyme.  The  be- 
ginnings of  rhyme  are  found  in  Aristophanes  and  in 
Horace,  and  Dr.  Charles  A.  Briggs  has  maintained 
that  it  is  not  wanting  even  in  Genesis  4  :  23,  24  and 
in  the  Psalms.  The  stanza  gives  limitation  and  unity 
to  lines.  The  refrain  relieves  their  monotony.  It  is 
impossible  in  this  article  even  to  summarize  Poe's  doc- 
trine. Suffice  it  to  say  that  he  has  propounded  an 
original  and  profound  theory  of  versification — a  theory 
which  frees  the  subject  from  much  superstitious  pedan- 
try of  the  past,  and  which  permits  the  poet  to  follow 
more  readily  the  promptings  of  the  Muse.  Of  all  our 
poets  he  has  given  most  scientific  expression  to  the 
technique  of  his  art. 


2OO  "  THE    HAUNTED    PALACE  " 

As  a  last  illustration  of  Poe's  theory  that  poetry  is 
a  metrical  appeal  to  emotion — an  appeal  skilfully 
adapted  to  awaken  yearning  and  regret — let  me  quote 
his  poem  entitled  "  The  Haunted  Palace  "  : 

In  the  greenest  of  our"  valleys 

By  good  angels  tenanted, 
Once  a  fair  and  stately  palace — 

Radiant  palace — reared  its  head. 
In  the  monarch  Thought's  dominion, 

It  stood  there; 
Never  seraph  spread  a  pinion 

Over  fabric  half  so  fair! 

Banners  yellow,  glorious,  golden, 

On  its  roof  did  float  and  flow 
(This — all  this — was  in  the  olden 

Time  long  ago), 
And  every  gentle  air  that  dallied, 

In  that  sweet  day, 
Along  the  ramparts  plumed  and  pallid, 

A  winged  odor  went  away. 

Wanderers  in  that  happy  valley, 

Through  two  luminous  windows  saw 
Spirits  moving  musically, 

To  a  lute's  well-tuned  law, 
Round  about  a  throne  where,  sitting, 

Porphyrogene, 
In  state  his  glory  well  befitting, 

The  ruler  of  the  realm  was  seen. 

And  all  with  pearl  and  ruby  glowing 

Was  the  fair  palace  door, 
Through  which  came  flowing,  flowing,  flowing, 

And  sparkling  evermore, 
A  troop  of  Echoes,  whose  sweet  duty 

Was  but  to  sing, 
In  voices  of  surpassing  beauty, 

The  wit  and  wisdom  of  their  king. 


A    PICTURE   OF   POE  S   SOUL  2OI 

But  evil  things,  in  robes  of  sorrow, 

Assailed  the  monarch's  high  estate; 
(Ah,  let  us  mourn,  for  never  morrow 

Shall  dawn  upon  him  desolate!) 
And  round  about  his  home  the  glory 

That  blushed  and  bloomed, 
Is  but  a  dim-remembered  story 

Of  the  old  time  entombed. 

And  travellers  now  within  that  valley, 

Through  the  red-litten  windows  see 
Vast  forms  that  move  fantastically 

To  a  discordant  melody; 
While,  like  a  ghastly  rapid  river, 

Through  the  pale  door 
A  hideous  throng  rush  out  forever, 

And  laugh — but  smile  no  more. 

"  The  Haunted  Palace  "  is  a  picture  of  Poe's  own 
soul.  It  reminds  us  of  "  The.  Living  Temple  "  by  the 
Puritan  John  Howe.  That  represents  human  nature 
as  originally  a  magnificent  temple  in  which  God  dwelt 
and  manifested  his  glory.  But  the  priests  were  faith- 
less and  the  spoiler  came;  it  was  deserted  by  Deity, 
and  only  broken  column  and  fallen  architrave  re- 
mained to  show  its  former  splendor;  it  came  to  be 
the  haunt  of  unclean  birds,  and  evil  spirits  congre- 
gated in  its  courts.  But  God  did  not  forsake  the  work 
of  his  own  hands;  at  infinite  cost  he  began  to  restore 
the  ruined  temple ;  he  will  not  cease  his  effort  until  he 
has  rescued  it  from  his  foes  and  has  filled  it  with  his 
praise.  But  the  palace  of  Poe's  soul  was  still  in 
possession  of  fiends,  and  he  had  no  hope  of  recovering 
the  glory  he  had  lost.  Exquisite  literary  art  witnessed 
to  the  greatness  of  his  original  endowment,  but  with 
this  art  there  was  bound  up  a  pessimistic  unbelief  that 
p 


2O2  CONFLICTING    ESTIMATES    OF    POE 

shut  out  all  the  light  of  heaven  and  left  him  a  prey 
to  remorse  and  despair.  His  life  and  work  teach  us  that 
true  poetry  is  born  only  of  true  character;  that  beauty 
cannot  be  divorced  from  truth;  that  art  for  art's  sake 
is  the  ruin  of  art  itself;  and  that  obedience  to  God 
and  acceptance  of  his  revelation  in  Christ  are  the  only 
means  of  restoring  lost  character  or  of  opening  to  us 
the  treasures  of  the  universe. 

No  one  of  our  poets  has  had  so  many  memoirs  writ- 
ten of  him,  and  about  no  other  has  been  waged  such 
warfare  of  opinion.  Emerson  calls  him  "  the  jingle- 
man";  Henry  James  thinks  his  verses  "valueless"; 
Brownell  regards  him  as  "  a  conjurer  in  literature  and 
a  charlatan,"  "  our  only  Ishmael  "  among  the  poets,  and 
"  our  solitary  artist."  But  Tennyson  is  quoted  by 
Brander  Matthews  as  ranking  Poe  "  highest  among 
American  poets — not  unworthy  to  stand  beside  Catul- 
lus, the  most  melodious  of  the  Latins,  and  Heine,  the 
most  tuneful  of  the  Germans."  Gosse  calls  Poe  the 
first  of  American  writers ;  and  Beyer  declares  that  "  he 
excels  all  English  writers  since  Milton  in  the  equality 
of  'his  artistry  in  both  the  great  forms  of  expression, 
prose  and  poetry."  Each  of  these  parties  has  much 
to  say  for  itself,  and  our  judgment  between  them  can- 
not be  an  unqualified  one.  Poe  is  certainly  great  in 
form.  But  a  haunting  melody  is  not  the  highest 
poetry.  Substance  must  equal  form,  or  the  mind  is 
unsatisfied.  Truth  and  goodness  must  furnish  that 
substance.  Every  human  work  must  ultimately  come 
before  Christ. as  its  Judge.  Let  us  ask  how  Christ 
judges  even  now.  It  is  the  purpose  of  these  essays  to 
weigh  our  poets  in  the  balances  of  the  sanctuary,  and 


GRISWOLD  S   VIEW    OF    POE  203 

to  estimate  their  moral  and  religious  significance.  We 
may  grant  to  Poe  a  technical  skill  and  musical  cadence 
as  great  as  Swinburne's,  while  we  find  in  him  a  bitter 
and  defiant  melancholy  like  that  of  Byron.  Lauvriere 
calls  him  "  the  poet  of  the  outcast  soul."  Andrew 
Lang  calls  his  poetry  "  the  echo  of  a  lyre  from  behind 
the  hills  of  death  " — yes,  we  add,  from  the  Inferno 
of  sin  and  guilt  and  despair — and  such  poetry  is  melody 
without  truth  and  without  love. 

I  close  my  essay  with  two  quotations.  The  first  is 
from  Griswold,  Poe's  chosen  literary  executor,  who 
knew  him  best  and  formed  the  most  unbiased  judg- 
ment of  his  life :  Poe,  says  Griswold, 

"  Was  at  all  times  a  dreamer — dwelling  in  ideal  realms  peo- 
pled with  the  creatures  and  the  accidents  of  his  brain.  He 
walked  the  streets,  in  madness  or  melancholy,  with  lips 
moving  in  indistinct  curses,  or  with  eyes  upturned  in  pas- 
sionate prayer  (never  for  himself,  for  he  felt,  or  professed  to 
feel,  that  he  was  already  damned,  but)  for  their  happiness 
who  at  the  moment  were  objects  of  his  idolatry;  or,  with  his 
glances  introverted  to  a  heart  gnawed  with  anguish,  and 
with  a  face  shrouded  in  gloom,  he  would  brave  the  wildest 
storms;  and  all  night,  with  drenched  garments  and  arms 
beating  the  winds  and  rains,  would  speak  as  if  to  spirits 
that  at  such  times  only  could  be  evoked  by  him  from  the 
Aidenn,  close  by  whose  portals  his  disturbed  soul  sought  to 
forget  the  ills  to  which  his  constitution  subjected  him — close 
by  the  Aidenn  where  were  those  he  loved — the  Aidenn  which 
he  might  never  see  but.  in  fitful  glimpses,  as  its  .gates  opened 
to  receive  the  less  fiery  and  more  happy  natures  whose  destiny 
to  sin  did  not  involve  the  doom  of  death. 

"  He  seemed,  except  when  some  fitful  pursuit  subjugated  his 
will  and  engrossed  his  faculties,  always  to  bear  the  memory 
of  some  controlling  sorrow.  The  remarkable  poem  of  'The 
Raven '  was  probably  much  more  nearly  than  has  been  sup- 
posed, even  by  those  who  were  very  intimate  with  him,  a 
reflection  and  an  echo  of  his  own  history.  He  was  that  bird's 


2O4  GRISWOLD  S   VIEW    OF    POE 

— '  unhappy  master  whom  unmerciful  Disaster 
Followed  fast  and  followed  faster  till  his  songs  one  burden 
bore: 

Till  the  dirges  of  his  Hope  that  melancholy  burden  bore 
Of  "  Never — nevermore."  ' 

"  Every  genuine  author,  in  a  greater  or  less  degree,  leaves 
in  his  works,  whatever  their  design,  traces  of  his  personal 
character:  elements  of  his  immortal  being,  in  which  the  in- 
dividual survives  the  person.  While  we  read  the  pages  of 
'  The  Fall  of  the  House  of  Usher/  or  of  '  Mesmeric  Revela- 
tions,' we  see  in  the  solemn  and  stately  gloom  which  invests 
one,  and  in  the  subtle  metaphysical  analysis  of  both,  indica- 
tions of  the  idiosyncrasies — of  what  was  most  remarkable  and 
peculiar — in  the  author's  intellectual  nature.  But  we  see  here 
only  the  better  phases  of  his  nature,  only  the  symbols  of  his 
juster  action;  for  his  harsh  experience  had  deprived  him  of 
all  faith,  in  man  or  woman.  He  had  made  up  his  mind  upon 
the  numberless  complexities  of  the  social  world,  and  the 
whole  system  with  him  was  an  imposture.  This  convic- 
tion gave  a  direction  to  his  shrewd  and  naturally  unamiable 
character.  Still,  though  he  regarded  society  as  composed 
altogether  of  villains,  the  sharpness  of  his  intellect  was  not 
of  that  kind  which  enabled  him  to  cope  with  villainy,  while 
it  continually  caused  him  by  overshots  to  fail  of  the  success 
of  honesty.  He  was  in  many  respects  like  Francis  Vivian,  in 
Bulwer's  novel  of  '  The  Caxtons.'  Passion,  in  him,  compre- 
hended many  of  the  worst  emotions  which  militate  against 
human  happiness.  You  could  not  contradict  him,  but  you 
raised  quick  choler;  you  could  not  speak  of  wealth,  but  his 
cheek  paled  with  gnawing  envy.  The  astonishing  natural  ad- 
vantages of  this  poor  boy — his  beauty,  his  readiness,  the 
daring  spirit  that  breathed  around  him  like  a  fiery  atmos- 
phere— had  raised  his  constitutional  self-confidence  into  an 
arrogance  that  turned  his  very  claims  to  admiration  into 
prejudices  against  him.  Irascible,  envious — bad  enough,  but 
not  the  worst — for  these  salient  angles  were  all  varnished 
over  with  a  cold  repellent  cynicism — his  passions  vented 
themselves  in  sneers.  There  seemed  in  him  no  moral  sus- 
ceptibility; and,  what  was  more  remarkable  in  a  proud  nature, 
little  or  nothing  of  the  true  point  of  honor.  He  had,  to  a 


"  THE    PALACE    OF   ART  "  2O5 

morbid  excess,  that  desire  to  rise  which  is  vulgarly  called 
ambition,  but  no  wish  for  the  esteem  or  the  love  of  his 
species — only  the  hard  wish  to  succeed — not  shine,  not  serve — 
succeed,  that  he  might  have  the  right  to  despise  a  world 
which  galled  his  self-conceit." 

And  my  last  quotation  is  from  Tennyson's  "  Palace 
of  Art."  His  picture  of  the  unbelieving  soul  who  in 
that  habitation  enthrones  herself  seems  a  description 
of  Foe's  ambition  and  of  Poe's  end : 

" '  I  take  possession  of  man's  mind  and  deed. 

I  care  not  what  the  sects  may  brawl. 
I  sit  as  God  holding  no  form  of  creed, 
But  contemplating  all.' 

"  Full  oft  the  riddle  of  the  painful  earth 

Flash'd  thro'  her  as  she  sat  alone, 
Yet  not  the  less  held  she  her  solemn  mirth, 
And  intellectual  throne. 

"And  so  she  throve  and  prosper'd;  so  three  years 

She  prosper'd;  on  the  fourth  she  fell, 
Like  Herod,  when  the  shout  was  in  his  ears, 
Struck  thro'  with  pangs  of  hell. 

"  Lest  she  should  fail  and  perish  utterly, 

'.God,  before  whom  ever  lie  bare 

Th.e  abysmal  deeps  of  personality, 

Plagued  her  with  sore  despair. 

"  Deep  dread  and  loathing  of  her  solitude 

Fell  on  her,  from  which  mood  was  born 
Scorn  of  herself;  again,  from  out  that  mood 
Laughter  at  her  self-scorn. 

" '  What!  is  not  this  my  place  of  strength,'  she  said, 

'  My  spacious  mansion  built  for  me, 
Whereof  the  strong  foundation-stones  were  laid 
Since  my  first  memory?' 


2O6  THE   LAST    WORDS   OF   POE 

"  But  in  dark  corners  of  her  palace  stood 

Uncertain  shapes;  and  unawares 
On  white-eyed  phantasms  weeping  tears  of  blood, 
And  horrible  nightmares, 

"  And  hollow  shades  enclosing  hearts  of  flame, 

And,  with  dim  fretted  foreheads  all, 
On  corpses  three-months-old  at  noon  she  came, 
That  stood  against  the  wall. 

"  She,  mouldering  with  the  dull  earth's  mouldering  sod, 

Inwrapt  tenfold  in  slothful  shame, 
Lay  there  exiled  from  eternal  God, 
Lost  to  her  place  and  name; 

"  And  death  and  life  she  hated  equally, 
And  nothing  saw,  for  her  despair, 
But  dreadful  time,  dreadful  eternity, 
No  comfort  anywhere; 

"  She  howl'd  aloud,  '  I  am  on  fire  within. 

There  comes  no  murmur  of  reply. 
What  is  it  that  will  take  away  my  sin, 
And  save  me  lest  I  die?  '  " 

Did  Poe,  in  his  last  hour,  feel  his  need  and  beg  for 
mercy?  Let  us  hope  that  this  was  his  meaning,  when 
he  cried,  "  Lord,  help  my  poor  soul !  "  and  let  us  hope 
that  He  who  had  mercy  upon  the  penitent  thief  had 
mercy  upon  him. 


HENRY  WADSWORTH 
LONGFELLOW 


HENRY  WADSWORTH 
LONGFELLOW 


THAT  is  a  great  day  in  one's  history  when  he  gets 
his  first  view  of  the  beauty  and  the  mystery  of  poetry. 
Far-reaching  vistas  open  before  him — a  new  world 
of  wonder  and  delight.  The  poet  who  awakens  his 
soul  to  see  what  the  poet  himself  saw,  and  so  creates 
in  him  the  poetic  instinct,  becomes  to  him  a  sort  of 
demigod,  and  is  worshiped  forever  after.  I  begin 
my  essay  on  Longfellow  with  vivid  recollection  of  the 
admiration,  and  even  awe,  with  which  he  first  inspired 
me.  He  introduced  me  to  literature,  and  gave  me  the 
freedom  of  the  mind.  His  "  Psalm  of  Life  "  encour- 
aged me  to  think  that  I  too  might  make  my  life  sub- 
lime. And  what  he  did  for  me  he  did  for  a  multitude 
of  others.  The  excellent  biography  written  by  Samuel 
Longfellow,  his  brother,  gives  extracts  from  many 
letters  of  men  well  known,  which  show  that  the  poet's 
early  productions  were  germs  from  which  sprang  a 
great  literary  harvest. 

My  purpose  in  this  essay,  however,  is  to  disclose 
even  a  larger  influence  of  Longfellow  than  this  upon 
individual  writers.  His  influence  was  national.  He 
rose  to  fame  in  a  time  of  comparative  uncouthness 
and  mediocrity.  We  were  too  young  for  literary  ele- 
gance, and  too  practical  to  appreciate  ideal  creations. 

209 


2IO        THE  PARENTS  OF  LONGFELLOW 

Longfellow  bridged  the  gulf  between  us  and  the  past, 
between  us  and  Europe,  between  us  and  the  whole 
world  of  romance.  He  was  one  of  the  first  to  profit 
by  absorbing  foreign  culture  and  by  importing  it  into 
America.  His  liberal,  loving,  sympathetic  spirit  was 
a  garden-plot  in  which  plants  hitherto  exotic  were 
nourished  for  distribution  over  our  whole  broad  com- 
monwealth. If  Bryant  was  the  father  of  American 
poetry,  Longfellow  was  as  certainly  its  first  culti- 
vator and  enricher.  With  a  broader  view  of  life  than 
Bryant's,  a  finer  sense  of  form  than  Emerson's,  a  keener 
apprehension  of  ideal  beauty  than  Whittier's,  a  sounder 
morality  than  Poe's,  he  was  our  first  all-round  poet  and 
teacher  of  poetry,  and  of  all  our  American  poets  the 
most  beloved. 

The  true  poet  is  born,  not  made,  and  he  owes  much 
to  his  ancestry.  Providence  ordained  that  Longfellow 
should  come  of  good  stock.  His  father  was  a  lawyer 
of  integrity  and  courtesy,  social  and  public-spirited,  a 
graduate  of  Harvard  College  and  a  genuine  scholar. 
He  was  so  highly  esteemed  that  his  fellow  citizens 
chose  him  to  be  their  representative  in  Congress.  The 
government  of  the  family  was  kindly,  but  strict.  The 
father  kept  watch  over  his  children's  education,  criti- 
cizing their  youthful  productions,  and  directing  their 
thoughts  to  God,  as  their  Creator,  Preserver,  and 
Friend.  From  his  mother  our  poet  probably  derived 
his  gifts  of  imagination  and  of  sympathy.  She  was 
beautiful  in  person  and  gracious  in  demeanor.  In  her 
early  days  she  was  fond  of  gaiety.  Music  and  dancing 
had  great  attractions  for  her.  She  loved  nature  also, 
even  in  its  wilder  and  more  sublime  aspects,  and  thun- 


ENVIRONMENT    OF    LONGFELLOW'S    BOYHOOD     21 1 

der-storms  were  her  delight.  But  she  was,  above  all, 
a  woman  of  old-fashioned  piety;  though  her  love  of 
Bible  and  sermon  and  psalm  was  accompanied  by  in- 
terest in  romance  and  by  endless  ministrations  to  the 
poor.  She  was  the  confidante  of  her  children,  the  cor- 
rector of  their  faults,  but  also  the  recipient  of  their 
joyful  and  hopeful  confessions.  If  parentage  alone 
could  make  a  poet,  Longfellow  was  in  this  respect 
richly  blest. 

It  is  also  true  that  the  poet  is  made,  and  not  born. 
He  owes  as  much  to  nurture  as  he  owes  to  nature. 
Who  shall  say  how  much  of  Longfellow's  power  was 
the  fruit  of  his  environment  and  of  his  education? 
His  poem,  "  My  Lost  Youth,"  is  a  memorial  of  the 
strong  influence  exerted  upon  him  by  his  home  in  Port- 
land, his  outlook  over  Casco  Bay,  and  his  wandering 
in  Deering's  Woods.  Casco  Bay,  in  full  view  of  Port- 
land, was  the  scene  of  a  naval  battle  in  the  war  of 
1812,  upon  which  the  boy  of  five  years  gazed  with 
wonder,  and  the  impression  of  which  he  never  lost : 

I  remember  the  sea-fight  far  away, 
How  it  thundered  o'er  the  tide! 
And  the  dead  captains,  as  they  lay 
In  their  graves,  o'erlooking  the  tranquil  bay 
Where  they  in  battle  died. 

And  the  sound  of  that  mournful  song 
Goes  through  me  with  a  thrill: 
"  A  boy's  will  is  the  wind's  will, 
And  the  thoughts  of  youth  are  long,  long  thoughts." 

"  The  shadows  of  Deering's  Woods,"  behind  the  town, 
were  remembered  as  the  scene  of  "  friendships  old  " 
and  "  early  loves  "  : 


212  "THE  BOOKISH  LONGFELLOW" 

And  Deering's  Woods  are  fresh  and  fair, 

And  with  joy  that  is  almost  pain 
My  heart  goes  back  to  wander  there, 
And  among  the  dreams  of  the  days  that  were, 
I  find  my  lost  youth  again. 

And  the  strange  and  beautiful  song, 
The  groves  are  repeating  it  still: 
"  A  boy's  will  is  the  wind's  will, 
And  the  thoughts  of  youth  are  long,  long  thoughts." 

He  does  well  to  close  each  stanza  with  two  lines  of 
that  old  Lapland  song;  for  "  the  child  is  father  of  the 
man,"  and  "  beginnings  make  endings." 

Nature  and  nurture  act  and  react  upon  each  other. 
The  boy  Longfellow  inherited  from  his  mother  a 
sprightliness  and  impressibility  which  enamored  him 
with  singing  and  dancing.  His  father  seems  to  have 
added  a  quiet  and  reserve  of  manner,  which  appeared 
in  his  avoidance  of  everything  noisy  or  violent.  As  a 
schoolboy,  he  did  work  equal  to  that  of  classmates 
twice  his  age.  He  was  a  lover  of  books,  and  even 
thus  early  merited  the  characterization  of  a  later  critic 
who  called  him  "  the  bookish  Longfellow."  His  home 
was  fairly  well  stocked  with  works  of  poetry  and  prose, 
and  the  boy  devoured  them.  But  the  first  book  that 
fascinated  him,  and  roused  his  ambition,  was  "  The 
Sketch  Book  "  of  Washington  Irving.  "  Whenever 
I  open  its  pages,"  he  says,  "  I  open  also  that  mysterious 
door  which  leads  back  into  the  haunted  chambers  of 
youth."  And  the  first  poet  to  whom  he  made  allegiance 
was  William  Cullen  Bryant.  In  his  later  years  he 
acknowledges  his  indebtedness,  and  quotes  Dante's  ad- 
dress of  gratitude  to  Vergil,  "  Thou  art  my  master  and 
my  author." 


LONGFELLOW  S    COLLEGE    CLASSMATES  213 

At  the  age  of  fifteen  Longfellow  entered  Bowdoin 
College  at  an  advanced  standing,  and  there  at  eighteen 
he  was  graduated.  The  institution  had  been  founded 
only  twenty  years  before,  at  Brunswick,  twenty-five 
miles  from  his  home  in  Portland.  His  father  was  one 
of  its  trustees.  It  had  begun  with  but  eight  students, 
and  a  single  building  which  was  the  residence  of  presi- 
dent and  pupils  alike.  In  our  poet's  .time  it  was  still 
a  small  college,  but  it  had  been  adopted  by  the  new 
State  of  Maine,  and  many  distinguished  citizens  had 
sent  their  sons  thither.  James  Bowdoin  had  presented 
it  with  a  costly  collection  of  paintings,  drawings,  and 
minerals — a  collection  which  he  had  made  in  Europe, 
and  which  was  finer  than  any  other  that  America  then 
possessed.  Nathaniel  Hawthorne  was  a  member  of 
Longfellow's  class.  He  was  a  shy  and  reserved  young 
man,  then  little  known  to  his  fellows,  but  with  whom 
in  after  years  our  poet  formed  one  of  his  warmest 
friendships.  John  S.  C.  Abbott  was  also  a  classmate; 
and  Franklin  Pierce,  afterward  President  of  the 
United  States,  was  a  student  in  the  college.  There  was 
much  of  emulation  and  ambition  in  that  little  company, 
and  it  was  here  and  now  that  both  Longfellow  and 
Hawthorne  made  their  first  ventures  into  the  field  of 
literature. 

Biographers  have  not  sufficiently  noted  the  fact  that 
Maine,  in  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century,  was 
still  a  home  of  the  American  Indian.  Its  lakes  were 
full  of  trout,  and  its  forests  full  of  deer.  The  Penob- 
scot  or  Passamaquoddy  chief,  in  his  paint  and  wam- 
pum and  feathers,  was  a  frequent  visitor  to  the  scat- 
tered villages;  and,  though  he  was  somewhat  tamed 


214  LONGFELLOW  S    LITERARY    AMBITION 

and  civilized,  legends  of  his  former  savagery  were  rife 
at  every  fireside.  Longfellow  became  interested  in 
Indian  life  and  manners ;  he  read  Heckewelder's  "  Ac- 
count "  of  their  history  and  customs ;  here  was  the 
germ  of  his  future  "  Hiawatha."  Now  too,  he  begins 
to  feel  the  poetic  impulse  and  to  write  verses.  But  it 
is  not  the  Algonquin  or  Ojibway  chief  who  furnishes 
the  theme;  it  is  rather  some  maiden,  of  fairer  com- 
plexion and  tenderer  spirit,  who  inspires  the  youthful 
poet.  As  a  specimen  of  his  earliest  versifying,  I  may 
quote  the  first  and  the  last  stanzas  of  his  poem  ad- 
dressed "  To  lanthe  "  : 

When  upon  the  western  cloud 

Hang  day's  fading  roses, 
When  the  linnet  sings  aloud 

And  the  twilight  closes,— 
As  I  mark  the  moss-grown  spring 

By  the  twisted  holly, 
Pensive  thoughts  of  thee  shall  bring 

Love's  own  melancholy. 

Then  when  tranquil  evening  throws 

Twilight  shades  above  thee, 
And  when  early  morning  glows, — 

Think  on  those  that  love  thee! 
For  an  interval  of  years 

We  ere  long  must  sever, 
But  the  hearts  that  love  endears 

Shall  be  parted  never. 

The  youth  of  eighteen  was  already  seeking  his  voca- 
tion, and  love-dreams  gave  place  to  preparation  for 
the  work  of  life.  He  had  written  many  college  poems, 
and  some  of  them  had  been  printed  in  the  "  United 
States  Literary  Gazette,"  published  in  Boston,  He 


LONGFELLOW    A    PROFESSOR    AT    BOWDOIN         21 5 

wrote  to  his  father  that  he  eagerly  aspired  after  future 
eminence  in  literature;  "my  whole  soul,"  he  says, 
"  burns  most  ardently  for  it,  and  every  earthly  thought 
centers  in  it."  But  he  counted  the  cost,  and  knew  that 
acquaintance  with  other  languages,  and  familiarity 
with  their  best  authors,  were  an  indispensable  condi- 
tion of  success.  At  first  he  aimed  only  at  a  post-gradu- 
ate year  at  Cambridge,  with  a  view  to  the  acquisition 
of  Italian.  Better  things,  however,  were  in  store  for 
him.  His  path  was  brightened,  at  his  graduation,  by 
an  invitation  from  the  board  of  trustees  to  the  pro- 
fessorship of  Modern  Languages,  for  the  establishment 
of  which  Madame  Bowdoin  had  given  to  the  college 
one  thousand  dollars.  The  invitation  was  coupled  with 
a  permission  to  spend  three  years  in  preparation,  by 
residence  abroad.  It  shows  great  confidence  in  his 
scholarly  gifts,  his  teaching  ability,  and  the  soundness 
of  his  character,  that  such  an  invitation  should  be  ex- 
tended to  a  young  man  who  had  yet  three  years  to 
spend  before  he  reached  his  majority.  The  invitation 
was  accepted  with  delight,  and  after  some  months  of 
delay,  during  which  he  'read  law  in  his  father's  office, 
he  .set  sail  in  an  ocean  packet  for  Europe. 

Foreign  travel  was  in  those  days  far  more  rare 
than  now.  It  was  all  the  more  a  mark  of  distinction. 
For  an  American,  it  meant  a  widening  of  view,  a  re-r 
lease  from  narrow  prejudices,  an  inspiration  to  better 
work.  The  sight  of  medieval  cathedrals  and  palaces 
made  the  wooden  architecture  of  his  own  country  seem 
like  the  card-houses  of  children.  Painting  and  sculp- 
ture revealed  to  him  for  the  first  time  the  glories  of 
art.  Other  languages  and  literatures  showed  him 


216          LONGFELLOW'S  FIRST  STAY  ABROAD 

both  the  merits  and  the  shortcomings  of  his  own. 
The  poverty  and  oppression  of  vast  populations  roused 
in  him  a  new  pride  and  gratitude,  as  he  compared  them 
with  the  free  and  well-to-do  life  of  his  native  land.  Per- 
haps the  most  important,  however,  of  all  the  benefits 
of  a  prolonged  stay  abroad  was  his  introduction  to  the 
past — the  past  of  literature,  politics,  and  history,  and 
to  that  past  the  acquisition  of  foreign  languages  opened 
the  door. 

No  young  man  ever  entered  the  great  European 
world  with  more  of  advantage  than  did  young  Long- 
fellow. Delicate  in  all  his  tastes,  a  born  hater  of  the 
rough  and  unseemly,  ambitious  and  industrious,  drink- 
ing in  knowledge  at  every  pore,  provided  with  letters 
which  admitted  him  at  once  to  the  society  of  litterateurs 
and  diplomats,  with  a  gentle  and  sincere  address  which 
made  friends  of  all  who  met  him,  he  found  everywhere 
the  very  teachers  and  helpers  of  whom  he  stood  in 
need.  Paris,  Madrid,  Rome,  Berlin,  London,  in  turn, 
were  the  scene  of  his  studies  and  associations.  In 
Spain  he  made  a  bosom  friend  of  Washington  Irving; 
in  Italy  he  had  confidential  'talks  with  George  W. 
Greene,  the  historian,  whose  letters  are  now  a  chief 
source  of  information  with  regard  to  our  poet's  inner 
life.  In  this  historian's  dedication  to  his  friend  of 
his  "  Life  of  General  Greene,"  we  read : 

"  Thirty-nine  years  ago,  this  month  of  April,  you  and  I 
were  together  at  Naples.  .  .  We  were  young  then,  with  life  all 
before  us;  and  in  the  midst  of  the  records  of  a  great  past  our 
thoughts  would  still  turn  to  our  own  future.  .  .  One  day — I 
shall  never  forget  it — we  returned  at  sunset  from  a  long  after- 
noon amid  the  statues  and  relics  of  the  Museo  Bourbonico. 
.  .  We  went  up  to  the  flat  roof  of  the  house,  where,  as  we 


LONGFELLOW    AS   A    TEACHER  217 

walked,  we  could  look  down  into  the  crowded  street  and  out 
upon  the  wonderful  bay  and  across  to  Ischia  and  Capri  and 
Sorrento,  and  over  the  housetops  and  villas  and  vineyards 
to  Vesuvius.  .  .  And  over  all,  with  a  thrill  like  that  of  solemn 
music,  fell  the  splendor  of  the  Italian  sunset.  We  talked  and 
mused  by  turns,  till  the  twilight  deepened  and  the  stars  came 
forth  to  mingle  their  mysterious  influences  with  the  overmas- 
tering magic  of  the  scene.  It  was  then  that  you  unfolded  to 
me  your  plans  of  life,  and  showed  me  from  what  '  deep  cis- 
terns' you  had  already  learned  to  draw.  From  that  day,  the 
office  of  literature  took  a  new  place  in  my  thoughts.  I  felt 
its  forming  power  as  I  had  never  felt  it  before." 

Three  years  of  this  wandering  yet  busy  life  made 
Longfellow  a  new  man.  Softened  and  enlarged  in 
spirit,  he  came  back  to  his  own  country,  full  of  am- 
bition to  impart  the  culture  which  he  had  himself 
acquired.  The  little  college  became  the  theater  of 
prelections  and  conversations  in  which  French,  Ger- 
man, and  Italian  were  made  to  give  up  their  treasures 
to  American  youth.  He  taught  by  example  as  well 
as  by  precept.  He  combined  graciousness  and  dig- 
nity, a  cheerful  familiarity  and  serious  intent  to  teach. 
No  wonder  that  the  stiff  routine  of  college  instruction 
received  something  of  a  shock,  and  that  the  new  pro- 
fessor became  exceedingly  popular.  In  that  day  real 
comradeship  between  teachers  and  students  was  al- 
most unknown.  It  was  a  great  gain  to  have  one  pro- 
fessor who  could  sufficiently  unbend  to  talk  familiarly 
with  his  pupils  about  the  things  in  which  they  were 
interested.  Longfellow  did  something  to  introduce 
an  improved  method  into  American  pedagogy. 

He  was  not  satisfied  with,  influencing  the  narrow 
circle  of  the  college.  Wider  fields  invited  him.  An 
inner  impulse  to  literary  production  had  long  possessed 
Q 


2i8          LONGFELLOW'S  FIRST  PROSE  WORK 

him.  It  had  been  repressed  by  the  thought  that  he 
lacked  both  ideas  and  power  to  express  them.  Now 
he  determined  to  trust  his  destiny  and  to  make  the  ven- 
ture. His  first  impulse  was  to  make  his  appeal  to  the 
public  in  prose,  and  Irving's  "  Sketch  Book  "  suggested 
the  general  plan.  It  was  in  1833,  during  the  last  of  his 
five  and  a  half  years  at  Bowdoin,  that  he  published 
"  Outre-Mer."  It  crystallized  what  his  years  of  travel 
had  left  in  solution.  The  jottings  of  his  diary  fur- 
nished most  of  the  material.  We  read  "  Outre-Mer  " 
to-day  with  a  sort  of  admiring  curiosity ;  it  has  interest 
as  a  chapter  in  the  history  of  literature ;  it  would  seem 
only  an  effusion  of  callow  youth  but  for  the  occa- 
sional apparition  in  it  of  original  genius.  It  is  a 
medley  of  impressions,  incidents,  descriptions,  and 
stories,  with  no  more  organic  unity  than  that  of  Boc- 
caccio's "  Tales."  But  Longfellow,  like  Milton,  had 
dedicated  himself  to  literature,  and  this  was  his  first 
offering  to  the  Muse.  It  showed  receptiveness  of  no 
ordinary  sort;  but  the  constructive  period  was  yet  to 
come. 

Until  now,  his  college  experiences  had  been  those  of 
the  courteous  and  popular  schoolmaster.  He  looked 
upon  his  profession,  he  writes,  "  from  a  far  nobler  and 
more  elevated  point  of  view  than  many  do.  I  take  an 
inexpressible  delight  in  watching  the  gradual  dawn 
of  intellect  in  the  youthful  mind."  Little  by  little, 
however,  the  routine  of  teaching  became  burdensome, 
and  he  longed  for  greater  freedom.  His  literary 
aspirations  demanded  more  of  leisure  for  original 
composition.  He  was  forced  to  teach  grammar,  he 
says,  when  he  would  fain  have  written  poems.  A 


LONGFELLOW'S  FIRST  GREAT  SORROW         219 

larger  outlook,  with  less  of  drudgery,  presented  itself 
when,  in  December,  1834,  he  was  invited  to  succeed 
George  Ticknor  as  Professor  of  Modern  Languages 
at  Harvard.  Here  too,  he  was  permitted  to  spend  a 
year  in  preparatory  study  abroad,  and  he  accepted 
the  new  position  gladly.  But  now  he  did  not  go  to 
Europe  alone.  He  had  married  Miss  Mary  Storer 
Potter,  a  Portland  acquaintance  of  his  earlier  years, 
a  young  lady  who  knew  her  Greek  and  Latin,  and 
whose  gentle  and  affectionate  disposition  combined 
with  beauty  of  countenance  to  make  her  markedly 
attractive.  The  one  mishap  of  Longfellow's  second 
stay  in  foreign  ports  was  her  sad  death  in  Rotter- 
dam. It  was  the  first  great  sorrow  of  his  life,  and  he 
has  fitly  commemorated  it  in  his  poem  entitled  "  The 
Footsteps  of  Angels  " : 

When  the  hours  of  Day  are  numbered, 

And  the  voices  of  the  Night 
Wake  the  better  soul,  that  slumbered, 

To  a  holy,  calm  delight; 

Ere  the  evening  lamps  are  lighted, 
And,  like  phantoms  grim  and  tall, 

Shadows  from  the  fitful  firelight 
Dance  upon  the  parlor  wall; 

Then  the  forms  of  the  departed 

Enter  at  the  open  door; 
The  beloved,  the  true-hearted, 

Come  to  visit  me  once  more; 


They,  the  holy  ones  and  weakly, 
Who  the  cross  of  suffering  bore, 

Folded  their  pale  hands  so  meekly, 
Spake  with  us  on  earth  no  more! 


22O         TURNING-POINT    IN    LONGFELLOW  S    LIFE 

And  with  them  the  Being  Beauteous, 
Who  unto  my  youth  was  given, 

More  than  all  things  else  to  love  me, 
And  is  now  a  saint  in  heaven. 

With  a  slow  and  noiseless  footstep 
Comes  that  messenger  divine, 

Takes  the  vacant  chair  beside  me, 
Lays  her  gentle  hand  in  mine. 

And  she  sits  and  gazes  at  me 

With  those  deep  and  tender  eyes, 

Like  the  stars,  so  still  and  saint-like, 
Looking  downward  from  the  skies. 

Uttered  not,  yet  comprehended, 
Is  the  spirit's  voiceless  prayer, 

Soft  rebukes,  in  blessings  ended, 
Breathing  from  her  lips  of  air. 

Oh,  though  oft  depressed  and  lonely, 

All  my  fears  are  laid  aside, 
If  I  but  remember  only 

Such  as  these  have  lived  and  died! 


The  death  of  Long-fellow's  wife  was  the  turning- 
point  in  his  literary  history.  It  gave  him  deeper  views 
of  life,  and  made  him  more  original  and  constructive 
in  his  thinking.  There  is  a  marked  difference  between 
"  Outre-Mer,"  published  before  his  second  European 
tour,  and  "  Hyperion,"  printed  after  his  return.  The 
former  has  a  careless  if  not  a  flippant  gaiety,  which 
often  seems  a  mere  overflow  of  youthful  spirits.  The 
latter  is  the  serious  attempt  to  depict  a  young  man's 
striving  after  ideal  excellence  in  thought  and  action. 
"  Outre-Mer  "  is  a  chance  collection  of  matters  sepa- 
rately interesting,  but  bound  together  by  no  thread  but 


THE    RISE   OF    UNITARIANISM  221 

that  of  personal  adventure.  "  Hyperion  "  is  a  con- 
nected tale;  it  rises  to  a  much  higher  level  of  aspira- 
tion; it  has  a  unity  of  conception,  to  which  each  part 
is  subordinate  and  contributory.  This  change  evinces 
in  the  author  not  only  an  intellectual  but  also  a  moral 
progress.  Affliction  has  sobered  and  enriched  him. 
He  can  now  become  the  poet  of  domestic  affection, 
and  can  describe  joys  and  sorrows  that  are  universal. 
To  be  a  great  poet,  however,  requires  more  than  this; 
only  the  highest  truth  can  enable  him  to  understand 
the  lowest;  he  needs  to  appreciate  the  facts  of  sin  and 
redemption ;  in  other  words,  to  know'  human  nature  in 
its  normal,  and  in  its  abnormal,  relations  to  God. 

It  was  the  old  Congregational  Calvinism  that  pre- 
vailed at  Brunswick  and  that  dominated  the  college. 
We  must  concede  that  the  federal  theology,  unaccom- 
panied by  an  experience  of  vital  union  with  Christ, 
was  a  theory  of  religion  puzzling  to  the  intellect  and 
repugnant  to  the  moral  sense.  Regarded  as  a  merely 
forensic  and  governmental  expression  of  historical  and 
biological  facts,  it  has  justification;  and,  in  the  light  of 
these,  the  Pauline  doctrine  of  Scripture  is  comprehen- 
sible. But  doctrine  always  tends  to  become  traditional. 
After  the  religious  revival  under  Jonathan  Edwards 
had  spent  its  force,  there  grew  up  a  new  scholasticism, 
which  was  more  speculative  than  religious.  Minor 
and  incidental  points  of  belief  came  to  be  insisted  on, 
as  if  they  were  fundamental  and  essential  tp  salvation. 
The  younger  generation  refused  to  accept  them.  The 
result  was  the  Unitarian  defection.  At  the  beginning, 
it  might  have  been  prevented  by  a  greater  tolerance 
and  a  less  bigoted  dogmatism  on  the  part  of  orthodox 


222  LONGFELLOW    UNEVANGELICAL 

theologians.  In  the  end,  the  movement  reached  its 
logical  goal,  and  denial  of  inspiration,  Trinity,  and 
atonement,  followed. 

Longfellow's  home  influences  had  been  those  of  the 
liberal  sort.  Traditional  doctrine  was  already  some- 
what modified  in  the  ministrations  of  the  Portland 
pulpit,  and  his  father  had  succeeded  in  securing  some 
changes  in  the  church's  creed.  Above  all,  that  creed 
was  interpreted  by  the  Christlike  lives  of  his  father 
and  his  mother.  At  Bowdoin  College,  he  was  brought 
for  the  first  time  into  an  atmosphere  of  traditional 
orthodoxy,  yet  at  the  same  time  an  atmosphere  of  in- 
quiry. The  young  intellect  of  that  day  asked  reasons 
for  its  faith.  The  minutiae  of  theology  did  not  interest 
our  eager  student.  He  lacked  as  yet  the  inner  experi- 
ence that  would  make  such  questions  absorbing.  A 
sort  of  religious  indifference  took  possession  of  him. 
His  attendance  at  religious  services  became  somewhat 
perfunctory.  He  longed  for  a  more  mild  and  ethical 
preaching;  and  when  a  Unitarian  church  was  organ- 
ized at  Brunswick,  he  gave  it  whatever  support  lay 
within  his  power.  There  is  little  doubt  that  his  en- 
thusiastic willingness  to  accept  a  Harvard  professor- 
ship was  to  some  extent  influenced  by  his  desire  to 
emerge  into  a  freer  theological,  as  well  as  a  freer  in- 
tellectual, field.  From  this  time,  Longfellow  was  an 
avowed  Unitarian. 

In  his  Inaugural  Address  at  Bowdoin,  he  had  given 
utterance  to  a  far-reaching  truth,  in  his  characteriza- 
tion of  the  work  he  hoped  to  do.  He  perceived  the 
religious  bearings  of  that  work,  and  spoke  of  the  feel- 
ing that  prompted  it: 


LONGFELLOW    A    CHRISTIAN    POET  223 

It  is  this  religious  feeling, — this  changing  of  the  finite  for 
the  infinite, — this  grasping  after  the  invisible  things  of  another 
and  a  higher  world, — which  marks  the  spirit  of  modern  litera- 
ture. 

What  he  thought  that  "  religious  feeling  "  to  be,  seems 
indicated  in  one  of  his  early  letters : 

Human  systems  have  done  much  to  deaden  the  true  spirit 
of  devotion  and  to  render  religion  merely  speculative.  Would 
it  not  be  better  for  mankind  if  we  should  consider  it  as  a 
cheerful  and  social  companion,  given  us  to  go  through  life 
with  us  from  childhood  to  the  grave,  and  to  make  us  hap- 
pier here  as  well  as  hereafter;  and  not  as  a  stern  and  chid- 
ing taskmaster,  to  whom  we  must  cling  at  last  through  mere 
despair,  because  we  have  nothing  else  on  earth  to  which  we 
can  cling?  I  love  that  view  of  Christianity  which  sets  it  in 
the  light  of  a  cheerful,  kind-hearted  friend,  and  which  gives 
its  thoughts  a  noble  and  a  liberal  turn.  The  doctrines  of 
men  have  long  been  taught  as  the  doctrines  of  an  infinitely 
higher  authority,  and  many  have  been  led  to  think  that  faith 
without  works  is  an  active  and  saving  principle. 

Longfellow  was  by  nature  and  by  education  a  Pela- 
gian. The  problem  of  moral  evil  never  seriously  vexed 
him.  Born  and  nurtured  amid  peaceful  and  moral 
surroundings,  with  a  quiet  and  studious  disposition, 
gentle  and  social  in  his  ways,  he  never  knew  any  deep 
conviction  of  sin,  never  felt  the  need  of  an  atoning 
Saviour,  never  shrank  from  the  holiness  of  God.  Love, 
compassion,  pity — these  divine  attributes  seemed  to 
him  all-inclusive.  That  God  is  righteous,  and  that  man 
is  fallen,  never  made  him  tremble.  The  self-condem- 
nation of  Augustine,  and  his  ecstatic  praise  for  re- 
demption, had  no  place  in  his  experience.  And  yet, 
in  a  certain  unevangelical  way,  he  was  a  Christian 
poet.  One  of  his  earliest  ambitions  was  that  of  writ- 


224  KAVANAGH        AND        HYPERION 

ing  a  poem,  the  title  of  which  should  be  "  Christus," 
and  in  which  apostolic,  medieval,  and  modern  Chris- 
tianity should  be  exhibited  in  one  great  trilogy.  This 
ambition  haunted  him  for  nearly  half  a  century,  but 
was  not  realized  until  1873.  The  translation  of  Dante's 
"  Divina  Comedia  "  is  another  indication  that  our  poet 
was  in  love  with  Christian  themes.  He  never  reached 
Dante's  heights,  because  he  had  never  sounded  Dante's 
depths.  It  was  only  the  superficial  aspects  of  Chris- 
tianity which  he  described.  He  did  not  understand 
the  plan  of  God ;  but  he  did  accept  its  results.  Let  us 
be  thankful  that,  even  so,  he  could  give  comfort  to 
multitudes  of  God's  children. 

I  have  said  that  the  death  of  Mrs.  Longfellow,  in 
the  midst  of  his  preparation  abroad  for  his  work  at 
Harvard,  was  the  turning-point  in  his  career.  From 
this  time  his  literary  activity  is  constructive  and  orig- 
inal. "  Kavanagh  "  is  an  idyl,  full  of  poetic  mate- 
rial, but  with  so  little  of  plot  and  with  so  much  of  sen- 
timent, that  novel-writing  seems  beyond  our  author's 
powers.  Its  motto,  however,  taken  from  Shakespeare, 
is  significant : 

"  The  flighty  purpose  never  is  o'ertook 
Unless  the  deed  go  with  it." 

This  intimates  that  the  writer  is  now  bent  on  actual 
achievement.  "  Hyperion,"  though  printed  before 
"  Kavanagh,"  is  really  his  last  work  of  importance  in 
prose.  Its  motto  is  suggested  by  his  recent  affliction : 

Look  not  mournfully  into  the  Past.  It  comes  not  back 
again.  Wisely  improve  the  Present.  It  is  thine.  Go  forth  to 


"  THE    VOICES    OF    THE    NIGHT  "  225 

meet  the  shadowy  Future,  without  fear,  and  with  a  manly 
heart. 

These  exercises  in  prose  show  industry  and  learning, 
together  with  the  delicacy  and  skill  of  a  literary  artist, 
but  they  were  only  preparatory  studies.  Longfellow's 
real  work  was  yet  to  come. 

On  his  second  European  journey,  the  Rhine,  Heidel- 
berg, Switzerland,  Paris,  in  succession,  diverted  him; 
but  in  1836,  after  fifteen  months  of  travel,  he  returned 
to  Cambridge,  where  he  taught  for  the  next  seventeen 
years,  and  where  he  lived  until  his  death  in  1882. 
With  his  residence  in  Cambridge  began  a  new  period 
in  his  history.  He  seems  now  to  have  discovered  his 
vocation,  and  to  have  devoted  to  it  all  his  powers. 
It  was  the  vocation  of  the  poet.  Its  public  inaugura- 
tion consisted  in  the  printing  of  his  first  book  of  poems, 
"  The  Voices  of  the  Night."  It  is  doubtful  whether 
any  other  work  of  a  poetical  sort  has  ever  had  so  im- 
mediate recognition  and  success,  or  so  great  an  in- 
fluence in  the  shaping  of  future  literary  production,  in 
America  at  least,  as  had  this  first  venture  of  Longfel- 
low. "  A  Psalm  of  Life  "  became  the  quickener  of 
ten  thousand  youthful  hearts,  who  thereafter  repeated 
to  themselves  the  poet's  words  of  courage : 

Lives  of  great  men  all  remind  us 
We  can  make  our  lives  sublime, 

And,  departing,  leave  behind  us 
Footprints  on  the  sands  of  time; 

Footprints,  that  perhaps  another, 
Sailing  o'er  life's  solemn  main, 

A  forlorn  and  shipwrecked  brother, 
Seeing,  shall  take  heart  again. 


226  INFLUENCE   OF   LONGFELLOW'S    POEMS 

Let  us,  then,  be  up  and  doing, 

With  a  heart  for  any  fate; 
Still  achieving,  still  pursuing, 

Learn  to  labor  and  to  wait. 

These  poems  are  soothing  as  well  as  inspiring.  Long 
labor  has  made  them  simple.  They  are  faultless  in 
point  of  taste.  They  appeal  not  only  to  the  heroic, 
but  also  to  the  pathetic,  elements  of  human  nature. 
Some  of  them  are  the  author's  efforts  to  relieve  his 
own  deep  depression,  and  they  naturally  minister  com- 
fort to  others.  They  are  not  distinctly  Christian 
poems,  but  they  are  by-products  of  Christianity,  and 
we  cannot  imagine  them  as  written  in  ante-Christian 
times.  We  may  apply  to  them  Longfellow's  own 
words  in  "  The  Day  is  Done  "  : 

Such  songs  have  power  to  quiet 

The  restless  pulse  of  care, 
And  come  like  the  benediction 

That  follows  after  prayer. 

Then  read  from  the  treasured  volume 

The  poem  of  thy  choice, 
And  lend  to  the  rhyme  of  the  poet 

The  beauty  of  thy  voice. 

And  the  night  shall  be  filled  with  music, 
And  the  cares,  that  infest  the  day, 

Shall  fold  their  tents,  like  the  Arabs, 
And  as  silently  steal  away. 

From  this  time  forward  our  poet's  life  was  one  of 
almost  uninterrupted  prosperity  and  of  ever-increasing 
fame.  His  second  marriage,  to  Frances  Elizabeth 
Appleton,  soon  put  him  in  possession  of  the  Craigie 


AMERICA  S    TRULY    NATIONAL   POET  22? 

House,  the  noblest  mansion  in  Cambridge,  the  former 
headquarters  of  General  George  Washington  at  the 
beginning  of  the  Revolutionary  war.  Here  he  dis- 
pensed a  liberal  hospitality.  He  entertained,  and  was 
entertained.  The  social  side  of  his  nature  was  quick- 
ened, and  he  was  inspired  to  literary  production.  He 
was  ready  for  his  task;  and,  though  somewhat  handi- 
capped by  his  college  duties,  he  managed  to  derive  even 
from  them  new  stimulus  and  inspiration.  He  came 
gradually  to  be  recognized  as  our  most  representative 
American  poet;  and  that,  because  he  combined  the 
broadest  literary  outlook  with  the  deepest  knowledge 
of  the  human  heart.  If  we  are  asked  to  name  the  chief 
poet  of  America,  we  must  answer  that  Longfellow  is 
our  poet  most  truly  national;  and  this  verdict  is  ren- 
dered not  only  by  Americans,  but  by  the  literary  world 
at  large.  This  place  in  the  world's  esteem  he  won  by 
right ;  because,  with  all  his  knowledge  of  foreign  litera- 
tures and  authors,  he  avoided  the  sentimentality  of 
European  romanticism,  while  at  the  same  time  he  glori- 
fied the  sweet  and  tender  instincts  of  human  nature. 
Culture  had  broadened  his  views  of  life,  but  he  had 
learned  that  the  sources  of  true  poetry  are  not  without, 
but  within.  We  may  almost  say  that  the  last  stanza  of 
the  "  Prelude,"  in  this  first  published  book  of  poetry, 
lays  down  the  program  of  his  future  life : 

"Look,  then,  into  thine  heart,  and  write! 

Yes,  into  Life's  deep  stream! 
All  forms  of  sorrow  and  delight, 
All  solemn  Voices  of  the  Night, 
That  can  soothe  thee,  or  affright, — 

Be  these  henceforth  thy  theme!" 


228         DEATH    OF    LONGFELLOW'S    SECOND    WIFE 

It  is  a  long  stride  forward,  but  I  must  here  take 
account  of  the  second  great  sorrow  of  Longfellow's 
life.  After  eighteen  years  of  happy  wedlock,  his  beau- 
tiful and  accomplished  wife  met  with  an  agonizing 
death.  She  had  been  sealing  up  in  separate  packages 
the  clippings  of  her  children's  hair,  when  a  lighted 
match  fell  to  the  floor  and  set  her  dress  on  fire.  Her 
husband  came  to  her  relief,  and  was  himself  severely 
burned.  His  help  was  vain ;  she  died  next  day ;  he  was 
left  in  a  distress  so  deep,  that  for  months  he  could 
not  speak  of  it;  the  effect  of  it  indeed  never  left  him;  it 
colored  all  his  views  of  life.  To  one  who  exhorted  him 
to  "  bear  his  cross,"  he  replied,  "  Yes,  but  what  if  one 
be  stretched  upon  it !  "  And  to  George  William  Curtis 
he  made  answer :  "  I  can  write  no  word.  God's 
will  be  done!  I  am  too  utterly  wretched  and  over- 
whelmed,— to  the  eyes  of  others,  outwardly,  calm ;  but 
inwardly,  bleeding  to  death."  In  his  journal,  many 
days  after,  he  added  these  lines  of  Tennyson : 

"Sleep  sweetly,  tender  heart,  in  peace; 

Sleep,  holy  spirit,  blessed  soul, 
While  the  stars  burn,  the  moons  increase, 
And  the  great  ages  onward  roll." 

"  Known  and  unknown,  human,  divine; 
Sweet  human  hand  and  lips  and  eye; 
Dear  heavenly  friend  that  canst  not  die; 
Mine,  mine,  for  ever,  ever  mine." 

Like  Bryant,  Longfellow  strove  to  console  himself 
by  translating  one  of  the  great  poets,  choosing  Dante. 
The  first  sonnet  prefixed  to  this  work,  which  was  com- 
pleted in  1866,  contains  the  suggestive  words: 


LONGFELLOW'S  PRODUCTIVE  YEARS  229 

I  enter  here  from  day  to  day, 
And  leave  my  burden  at  this  minster  gate. 

It  was  a  long  time  before  he  plucked  up  courage  to 
write  any  verses  of  his  own.  Among  the  verses  then 
written,  there  was  found  in  a  portfolio  after  his  death, 
the  poem  entitled  "  The  Cross  of  Snow  " ;  and  that 
poem  is  the  best  proof  of  his  depth  of  feeling,  and  at 
the  same  time  his  inability,  with  all  his  gifts  of  ex- 
pression, to  put  that  feeling  into  words : 

In  the  long,  sleepless  watches  of  the  night, 

A  gentle  face — the  face  of  one  long  dead — 
Looks  at  me  from  the  wall,  where  round  its  head 
The  night-lamp  casts  a  halo  of  pale  light. 

Here  in  this  room  she  died;  and  soul  more  white 
Never  through  martyrdom  of  fire  was  led 
To  its  repose;  nor  can  in  books  be  read 
The  legend  of  a  life  more  benedight. 

There  is  a  mountain  in  the  distant  West 
That,  sun-defying,  in  its  deep  ravines 
Displays  a  cross  of  snow  upon  its  side. 

Such  is  the  cross  I  wear  upon  my  breast 

These  eighteen  years,  through  all  the  changing 

scenes 
And  seasons,  changeless  since  the  day  she  died. 

The  years  that  intervened  between  these  two  great 
sorrows,  the  years  from  1843  to  1861,  were  our  poet's 
most  productive  years.  Providence  had  favored  him 
with  every  advantage  and  facility.  He  had  passed 
from  adolescence  to  manhood;  he  had  mastered  the 
languages  and  literatures  of  Europe;  he  was  the  idol 
of  a  notable  literary  circle ;  Agassiz,  Hawthorne,  Hil- 
lard,  Felton,  Sumner,  Prescott,  were  his  friends;  in 
fact,  association  with  them  was  so  close,  that  there  was 


230  "  THE    VILLAGE    BLACKSMITH  " 

talk  of  a  "  Mutual  Admiration  Society  " ;  and,  when 
his  work  was  reviewed  by  one  of  its  members,  a  critic 
wrote  after  its  title,  "  Insured  in  The  Mutual."  But 
Longfellow  was  never  led  astray,  either  by  criticism  or 
by  applause.  He  was  an  industrious  and  conscientious 
workman,  and  even  the  slightest  of  his  poems  bore 
marks  of  scrupulous  care  and  artistic  skill.  A  stanza 
of  "  The  Village  Blacksmith  "  well  expresses  the  spirit 
of  his  work : 

Toiling, — rejoicing, — sorrowing, 

Onward  through  life  he  goes; 
Each  morning  sees  some  task  begin, 

Each  evening  sees  it  close; 
Something  attempted,  something  done, 

Has  earned  a  night's  repose. 

During  this  comparatively  youthful  period,  Long- 
fellow gave  to  the  world  the  best  fruits  of  his  brain 
and  heart.  No  products  of  his  later  years,  for  purely 
poetic  merit,  surpass  "  Excelsior,"  "  The  Belfry  of 
Bruges,"  "  The  Rainy  Day,"  and  "  Mezzo  Cammin." 
This  last  sonnet,  written  at  Boppard  on  the  Rhine  in 
1842,  just  before  leaving  for  home,  so  nobly  expresses 
the  spirit  of  his  life,  that  I  cannot  refrain  from  quot- 
ing it : 

Half  of  my  life  is  gone,  and  I  have  let 

The  years  slip  from  me  and  have  not  fulfilled 
The  aspiration  of  my  youth,  to  build 
Some  tower  of  song  with  lofty  parapet. 

Not  indolence,  nor  pleasure,  nor  the  fret 
Of  restless  passions  that  would  not  be  stilled, 
But  sorrow,  and  a  care  that  almost  killed, 
Kept  me  from  what  I  may  accomplish  yet; 

Though,  half-way  up  the  hill,  I  see  the  Past 


"  EVANGELINE  23! 

Lying  beneath  me  with  its  sounds  and  sights, — 
A  city  in  the  twilight  dim  and  vast, 
With  smoking  roofs,  soft  bells,  and  gleaming 

lights,—       . 

And  hear  above  me  on  the  autumnal  blast 
The  cataract  of  Death  far  thundering  from  the 
heights. 

Here  is  true  poetry,  and  with  it  a  modesty  equal  to 
ihat  of  the  youthful  Milton.  Was  this  lofty  ambition 
ever  realized?  With  all  our  admiration  'for  Long- 
fellow's gifts,  we  must  hold  that  he  was  most  success- 
ful in  his  shorter  poems,  and  that  he  lacked  the  genius 
to  construct  an  epic.  His  technical  skill  increased  with 
years,  but  his  creative  power  waned.  Nor  was  he  a 
dramatic  poet.  I  do  not  now  have  in  mind  "  The 
Spanish  Student,"  which  is  a  comparatively  juvenile 
production,  with  romantic  reminiscences  of  Byron  and 
of  Goethe,  though  it  lacks  the  sentiment  of  the  one  and 
the  fire  of  the  other.  I  refer  to  such  works  as  "  Evan- 
geline,"  "  Hiawatha,"  "  The  Courtship  of  Miles  Stand- 
ish,"  and  most  of  all,  to  what  Longfellow  intended 
to  make  the  great  and  final  work  of  his  life,  his  poem 
entitled  "  Christus."  Let  me  say  a  word  of  each  of 
these  in  succession.  "  Evangeline  "  is  an  idealization 
of  true  love,  with  its  patience  and  faithfulness.  The 
Acadian  maiden,  separated  from  her  lover  on  their 
marriage  day,  seeks  him  for  years,  only  to  find  him  at 
last  an  old  man  dying  in  a  hospital : 

Vainly  he  strove  to  whisper  her  name,  for  the  accents 

unuttered 
Died  on  his  lips,  and  their  motion  revealed  what  his  tongue 

would  have  spoken. 

Vainly  he  strove  to  rise;  and  Evangeline,  kneeling  beside  him, 
Kissed  his  dying  lips,  and  laid  his  head  on  her  bosom. 


232  "  THE    SONG    OF    HIAWATHA  " 

Sweet  was  the  light  of  his  eyes;  but  it  suddenly  sank  into 

darkness, 
As  when  a  lamp  is  blown  out  by  a  gust  of  wind  at  a  casement. 

"  Evangeline  "  is  probably  the  most  popular  of  our 
poet's  works.  It  stirs  deep  founts  of  feeling,  and  the 
pathos  of  the  story  is  undeniable.  Hawthorne  gave 
Longfellow  the  theme,  but  our  poet  worked  it  out  in 
verse.  The  hexameter  has  never  been  better  domes- 
ticated in  English.  Goethe's  "  Hermann  and  Doro- 
thea "  is  its  only  poetical  rival,  and  the  work  of  Goethe 
is  inferior  in  its  direct  appeal  to  the  heart.  The  power 
of  "  Evangeline  "  is  proved  by  an  ever-increasing  in- 
flux of  pilgrims  into  Nova  Scotia,  and  an  ever-increas- 
ing interest  in  the  haunts  of  Gabriel  and  Evangeline. 
Grand-Pre  and  the  Basin  of  Minas  are  consecrated 
localities.  Though  the  "  forest  primeval  "  has  now 
disappeared,  the  traveler  still  imagines  the  scene  as  it 
was  two  centuries  ago,  and  repeats  to  himself  the  words 
with  which  the  poet  begins  his  story : 

This  is  the  forest  primeval.    The  murmuring  pines  and  the 

hemlocks, 
Bearded  with  moss,  and  in  garments  green,  indistinct  in  the 

twilight, 

Stand  like  Druids  of  eld,  with  voices  sad  and  prophetic, 
Stand  like  harpers  hoar,  with  beards  that  rest  on  their 

bosoms. 

"  The  Song  of  Hiawatha,"  more  than  any  other 
work  of  literature,  more  even  than  the  novels  of 
Cooper,  preserves  to  us  the  spirit  and  the  life  of  the 
American  Indian.  The  Finnish  poem  of  "  Kalevala  " 
suggested  the  meter,  and  Schoolcraft's  "  Algic  Re- 
searches "  furnished  most  of  the  legends.  There  is  a 


"  THE   SONG    OF    HIAWATHA  "        .  233 

religious  element  in  the  story,  which  shows  the  bent 
of  Longfellow's  mind  in  matters  of  theology,  and 
which  we  must  not  fail  to  take  account  of.  In  his 
"  Introduction,"  he  makes  appeal  to  the  reader: 

Ye  whose  hearts  are  fresh  and  simple, 
Who  have  faith  in  God  and  Nature, 
Who  believe  that  in  all  ages 
Every  human  heart  is  human, 
That  in  even  savage  bosoms 
There  are  longings,  yearnings,  strivings 
For  the  good  they  comprehend  not, 
That  the  feeble  hands  and  helpless, 
Groping  blindly  in  the  darkness, 
Touch  God's  right  hand  in  that  darkness 
And  are  lifted  up  and  strengthened; — 
Listen  to  this  simple  story, 
To  this  Song  of  Hiawatha! 

The  story  of  Hiawatha's  Childhood,  his  Fasting,  his 
Friends,  his  Sailing,  his  Fishing,  his  Wooing,  his 
Wedding-feast,  of  the  Ghosts,  the  Famine,  the  White 
Man's  Foot,  and  of  Hiawatha's  Departure,  is  an  ideal- 
ized picture  of  Indian  life  and  Indian  religion.  The 
poet  has  contradicted  the  dreadful  doctrine  that  the 
only  good  Indian  is  a  dead  Indian,  and  has  taught  us 
anew  that  "  in  every  nation  he  that  feareth  God  and 
worketh  righteousness  is  acceptable  unto  him  " : 

Thus  departed  Hiawatha, 
Hiawatha  the  Beloved, 
In  the  glory  of  the  sunset, 
In  the  purple  mists  of  evening, 
To  the  regions  of  the  home-wind, 
Of  the  Northwest-Wind,  Keewaydin, 
To  the  Islands  of  the  Blessed, 
To  the  Kingdom  of  Ponemah, 
To  the  Land  of  the  Hereafter. 


COURTSHIP    OF    MILES    STANDISH  " 

"  The  Courtship  of  Miles  Standish  "  is  a  kind  of 
Puritan  pastoral,  the  scene  of  which  is  laid,  as  the 
poem  relates,  "  In  the  Old  Colony  days,  in  Plymouth, 
the  land  of  the  Pilgrims."  John  Alden  undertakes  to 
win  the  heart  of  Priscilla  for  Miles  Standish,  although 
John  himself  loves  her,  and  only  out  of  loyalty  to  his 
friend  has  undertaken  to  speak  for  another : 

But  as  he  warmed  and  glowed,  in  his  simple  and  eloquent 

language, 

Quite  forgetful  of  self,  and  full  of  the  praise  of  his  rival, 
Archly  the  maiden  smiled,  and,  with  eyes  overrunning  with 

laughter, 

Said,  in  a  tremulous  voice,  "  Why  don't  you  speak  for  yourself, 
John?" 

And  so,  all  unexpectedly,  John  Alden  wins  his  bride, 
and  takes  her  to  his  home.  The  hard  life  of  the  Pil- 
grims is  seen  to  have  had  its  sunshine  as  well  as  its 
shadows : 

Like  a  picture  it  seemed  of  the  primitive,  pastoral  ages, 
Fresh  with  the  youth  of  the  world,  and  recalling  Rebecca  and 

Isaac, 

Old  and  yet  ever  new,  and  simple  and  beautiful  always, 
Love  immortal  and  young  in  the  endless  succession  of  lovers. 
So  through  the  Plymouth  woods  passed  onward  the  bridal 

procession. 

All  these  longer  poems  fail  to  reach  the  highest 
mark,  by  reason  of  their  very  profuseness  and  facility. 
There  is  in  them  too  much  of  merely  superficial  out- 
flow. They  lack  intensity  and  condensation.  This 
is  particularly  true  in  that  poem  which  Longfellow 
wished  to  be  his  greatest — the  poem  entitled  "  Chris- 
tus."  It  was  to  be  an  idealized  history  of  Christianity, 


"  CHRISTUS  "  235 

in  apostolic,  medieval,  and  modern  times,  and  was  to 
illustrate  successively  the  virtues  of  faith,  hope,  and 
charity.  The  apostolic  portion  of  the  work  is  called 
"  The  Divine  Tragedy."  This  is  little  more  than  a 
somewhat  commonplace  versification  of  the  story  of 
the  Gospels.  The  second  part  is  entitled  "  The  Golden 
Legend."  It  aims  to  show  that,  through  the  darkness 
of  the  Middle  Ages,  there  ran  a  stream  of  faith,  which 
preserved  the  apostolic  tradition.  The  third  part  is 
called  "  The  New  England  Tragedies,"  and  this  pre- 
sents to  us  Puritans  and  Quakers,  as  still  aiming 
to  subdue  the  world,  and  to  bring  in  the  kingdom  of 
God.  The  conception  is  noble,  and  the  execution  is 
often  interesting.  Yet  we  must  confess  that  our  atten- 
tion sometimes  flags.  No  paraphrase,  whether  metrical 
or  prosaic,  can  improve  upon  the  simple  narrative  of 
the  Gospels.  "  The  Golden  Legend  "  is  an  imitation, 
possibly  unconscious,  of  the  second  part  of  Goethe's 
"  Faust,"  with  its  symbolic  and  supernatural  para- 
phernalia— a  diffuse  and  dreary  application  of  the 
Christian  "  Legend  "  to  actual  life.  "  The  New  Eng- 
land Tragedies "  come  nearest  to  reality,  and  seem 
the  only  permanently  valuable  part  of  the  lengthy  poem. 
The  fundamental  defect  in  this  trilogy  is  its  in- 
sufficient estimate  of  Jesus  Christ.  He  is  the  gentle 
and  sympathizing  friend,  the  model  of  virtue,  the 
worker  of  wonders,  yes,  even  the  man  of  sorrows ;  but 
he  is  not  what  the  New  Testament  represents  him  to 
be — Immanuel,  God  with  us,  in  whom  dwelleth  all 
the  fulness  of  the  Godhead  bodily.  His  preexistence, 
incarnation,  atonement,  and  omnipresence  with  his 
people,  are  ignored.  One  might  read  "  Christus " 


236  DEFECTS    OF   LONGFELLOW'S    THEOLOGY 

from  beginning  to  end,  and  never  learn  that  it  is  he 
through  whom  alone  God  is  revealed,  and  that  only  he 
is  the  medium  through  whom  God  creates,  upholds, 
and  redeems.  The  result  is  that  Christianity  is  only  a 
"  Golden  Legend,"  and  there  is  no  personal  and  pres- 
ent Christ  in  Christian  history.  A  mythological  atmos- 
phere envelops  the  whole  story,  and  it  seems  only  a 
poet's  dream.  The  fortitude  and  faith  of  Puritan  and 
Quaker  have  no  sufficient  justification.  Our  poet's  plan 
is  too  large  for  his  material.  His  "•  Christus  "  is  in- 
deed a  "  Mystery  " ;  for  it  gives  no  real  explanation  of 
Christianity,  or  of  its  permanence  and  progress  in  the 
world.  Michelangelo  had  more  insight  into  the  secret, 
when  he  painted  on  the  ceiling  of  the  Sistine  Chapel 
that  majestic  figure  of  the  Creator  in  human  form,  and 
filled  the  whole  end  of  that  same  chapel  with  the  pic- 
ture of  Christ's  Final  Judgment.  And  Jonathan  Ed- 
wards had  greater  insight  still,  when  he  planned  a 
"  History  of  Redemption,"  which  began  with  eternity 
past,  and  concluded  with  eternity  to  come,  but  in  which 
Christ  was  the  only  Revealer  of  God,  the  only  Lord 
and  King. 

Longfellow  had  neither  the  genius,  nor  the  faith,  of 
Michelangelo  or  of  Jonathan  Edwards.  His  insuf- 
ficient estimate  of  Jesus  Christ  was  the  logical  conse- 
quence of  his  ignorance  of  the  holiness  of  God,  and  of 
the  deep  damnation  of  human  sin.  Sin  to  him  is  a  mis- 
fortune and  a  disease,  but  never  guilt  and  ruin.  The 
green  apple  needs  only  sunshine  and  rain  to  ripen  it,  for 
there  is  no  worm  at  the  heart.  There  needs  no  divine 
Saviour  to  redeem,  no  suffering  of  the  Son  of  God  to 
reveal  the  heart  of  the  Father  or  to  win  the  hearts  of 


LONGFELLOW  S  SHORTER  POEMS        237 

men.  The  accusations  of  conscience  and  the  fearful 
looking  for  of  judgment  are  illusions  of  the  unenlight- 
ened mind.  Little  sin  means  a  belittled  Christ;  and  of 
this  belittled  Christ  Longfellow  is  the  apostle. 

Let  us  remember  that  the  apostles  of  old  were  once 
in  Longfellow's  state  of  mind,  and  even  in  that  state  of 
mind  did  some  preaching  of  the  gospel.  They  were 
sent  out  on  a  trial-mission,  before  the  resurrection  and 
before  Pentecost.  They  were  Christians  of  an  infantile 
sort,  and  they  had  learned  some  lessons  in  Christ's 
kindergarten.  In  spite  of  its  defects,  their  message 
was  good  news,  and  it  brought  comfort  to  many  hearts. 
So  we  are  thankful  for  the  elements  of  truth  in  the 
poetry  of  Longfellow,  and  we  doubt  not  that  his 
poetry  has  blessed  the  world.  How  much  greater 
would  have  been  its  power,  if  he  had  grasped  the  truth 
that  Christ  is  God  manifest  in  the  flesh,  the  atoning 
and  omnipresent  Saviour,  the  guiding  force  in  human 
history,  the  arbiter  of  human  destinies,  before  whom 
every  knee  in  heaven  and  earth  shall  bow ! 

We  betake  ourselves  to  Longfellow's  shorter  poems 
for  a  more  detailed  account  of  his  theology. .  His 
"  Hymn  for  My  Brother's  Ordination  "  seems,  at  first 
sight,  to  be  an  expression  of  the  common  Christian 
faith  : 

Christ  to  the  young  man  said:  "  Yet  one  thing  more- 

If  thou  wouldst  perfect  be, 
Sell  all  thou  hast  and  give  it  to  the  poor, 

And  come  and  follow  me!" 

Within  this  temple  Christ  again,  unseen, 

Those  sacred  words  hath  said 
And  his  invisible  hands  to-day  have  been 

Laid  on  a  young  man's  head. 


238     LONGFELLOW    NEITHER    SKEPTIC    NOR    MYSTIC 

And  evermore  beside  him  on  his  way 

The  unseen  Christ  shall  move, 
That  he  may  lean  upon  his  arm  and  say, 

"Dost  thou,  dear  Lord,  approve?" 

Beside  him  at  the  marriage  feast  shall  be, 

To  make  the  scene  more  fair; 
Beside  him  in  the  dark  Gethsemane 

Of  pain  and  midnight  prayer. 

O  holy  trust!    O  endless  sense  of  rest! 

Like  the  beloved  John 
To  lay  his  head  upon  the  Saviour's  breast, 

And  thus  to  journey  on! 

This  is  not  a  prayer  to  Christ  nor  an  assurance  of 
his  personal  presence.  It  is  rather  an  imaginative  con- 
cession to  traditional  Christian  feeling.  Longfellow 
was  no  critic  and  no  skeptic.  He  had  no  sympathy 
with  agnosticism.  His  bent  was  rather  toward  the 
mystical  element  in  Christianity.  But  the  lack  of  an 
inward  experience  of  the  power  of  sin  made  all  his 
religious  conceptions  ideal  and  poetical,  rather  than 
definite  and  practical.  Whatever  was  sweet  and  beau- 
tiful pleased  him,  but  he  took  no  particular  care  to  in- 
vestigate its  scientific  value.  He  could  appropriate, 
for  purposes  of  poetry,  much  of  the  gospel  idea  of 
union  with  Christ,  although  he  would  have  been  un- 
willing to  grant  that  this  Christ  is  anything  more 
than  are  other  dear  friends  who  have  been  long  de- 
parted, but  who,  as  we  love  to  think,  are  still  invisibly 
ministering  to  our  good.  He  was  as  far  from  the  true 
Christian  mysticism  as  he  was  from  sheer  agnosticism. 
We  may  well  compare  his  "  Hymn  for  my  Brother's 
Ordination  "  with  the  opening  lines  of  Tennyson's  "  In 


LONGFELLOW    TENDS    TO    PAGAN    VIEWS          239 

Memoriam,"  in  which  are  asserted  so  strongly  a  faith 
in  Christ's  Creatorship  and  Lordship  in  the  Universe, 
his  possession  of  the  Truth  of  which  human  philoso- 
phies are  only  fitful  gleams,  and  his  rightful  claim  to 
the  absolute  submission  of  every  human  will : 

"  Strong  Son  of  God,  immortal  Love, 

Whom  we,  that  have  not  seen  thy  face, 
By  faith,  and  faith  alone,  embrace, 
Believing  where  we  cannot  prove; 

"  Thine  are  these  orbs  of  light  and  shade; 
Thou  madest  Life  in  man  and  brute; 
Thou  madest  Death;  and  lo,  thy  foot 
Is  on  the  skull  which  thou  hast  made. 


"  Thou  seemest  human  and  divine, 

The  highest,  holiest  manhood,  thou. 
Our  wills  are  ours,  we  know  not  how; 
Our  wills  are  ours,  to  make  them  thine. 

"  Our  little  systems  have  their  day; 

They  have  their  day  and  cease  to  be; 

They  are  but  broken  lights  of  thee, 

And  thou,  O  Lord,  art  more  than  they." 

Longfellow  could  never  have  subscribed  to  this  utter- 
ance, and  still  less  could  he  have  taken  upon  his  lips 
the  sublime  confession  of  the  apostle  Paul :  "  It  is  no 
longer  I  that  live,  but  Christ  liveth  in  me;  and  the 
life  which  I  now  live  in  the  flesh,  I  live  in  faith,  the 
faith  which  is  in  the  Son  of  God,  who  loved  me,  and 
gave  himself  up  for  me."  Paul  believed  in  Christ's 
deity  and  atonement,  as  Longfellow  did  not. 

Indeed,  we  mark  a  growing  tendency  toward  a  pagan 
view  of  the  world  and  of  religious  things,  as  the  years 


24O  THE    MASQUE    OF    PANDORA 

go  on.  German  influences  were  strong,  and  to  some 
extent  Goethe  was  the  poet's  model.  Unevangelical 
theology,  in  cutting  loose  from  Christ's  control,  tends 
ever  to  a  liberalism  which  denies  special  revelation,  and 
regards  Christianity  as  only  one  of  many  natural  re- 
ligions, no  one  of  which  has  proper  claim  to  inspira- 
tion or  supremacy.  The  classical  mythology  becomes 
even  more  satisfying,  to  this  abnormal  taste,  than  are 
the  definite  and  authoritative  demands  of  a  historic 
revelation.  "  The  Masque  of  Pandora  "  is  the  heathen 
version  of  the  Fall  of  Man.  When  Pandora  is  tempted 
to  open  the  box  in  which  are  imprisoned  all  the  future 
ills  of  humanity,  she  speaks  to  her  own  heart : 

No  one  sees  me, 

Save  the  all-seeing  Gods,  who,  knowing  good 
And  knowing  evil,  have  created  me 
Such  as  I  am,  and  filled  me  with  desire      ^ 
Of  knowing  good  and  evil  like  themselves. 
I  hesitate  no  longer.    Weal  or  woe, 
Or  life  or  death,  the  moment  shall  decide. 

She  lifts  the  lid,  and  the  evil  is  done : 

Fever  of  the  heart  and  brain, 
Sorrow,  pestilence,  and  pain, 
Moans  of  anguish,  maniac  laughter, 
All  the  evils  that  hereafter 
Shall  afflict  and  vex  mankind, 
All  into  the  air  have  risen 
From  the  chambers  of  their  prison; 
Only  Hope  remains  behind. 

Now  Pandora  is  a  prey  to  anguish  and  to  fear.  Con- 
science witnesses  against  her,  and  the  Eumenides,  the 
Furies,  threaten.  Pandora  resigns  herself  to  their  chas- 
tisement : 


THE    MASQUE    OF    PANDORA  24! 

Me  let  them  punish. 

Only  through  punishment  of  our  evil  deeds, 
Only  through  suffering,  are  we  reconciled 
To  the  immortal  Gods  and  to  ourselves. 

But  the  Eumenides  reply : 

Never  by  lapse  of  time 

The  soul  defaced  by  crime 
Into  its  former  self  returns  again; 

For  every  guilty  deed 

Holds  in  itself  the  seed 
Of  retribution  and  undying  pain. 

Evangelical  theology  does  not  grant  that  God  created 
men  such  as  they  now  are,  or  that  he  "  filled  them 
with  desire  of  knowing  good  and  evil  like  himself." 
It  holds  that  this  longing  for  that  which  is  forbidden  is 
the  consequence  and  the  penalty  of  man's  free  choice 
to  disobey,  instead  of  letting  God's  will  rule  within 
him.  And  evangelical  theology  does  not  grant  that 
suffering  the  punishment  of  his  evil  deeds  of  itself 
reconciles  man  either  to  God  or  to  himself.  There 
must  be  also  God's  own  suffering  on  man's  account,  and 
the  renewing  of  man's  spirit  by  the  Spirit  of  God. 
If  by  "  Helios,"  in  this  poem,  is  meant  "  the  Sun 
of  Righteousness,"  Jesus  Christ,  we  may  subscribe  to 
its  last  stanza,  and  give  it  a  Christian  interpretation : 

Never  shall  be  the  loss 

Restored,  till  Helios 
Hath  purified  them  with  his  heavenly  fires; 

Then  what  was  lost  is  won, 

And  the  new  life  begun, 
Kindled  with  nobler  passions  and  desires. 

"  Hermes  Trismegistus  "  seems  to  be  a  confession 
that  the  poet  despaired  of  any  solution  of  the  mysteries 
of  existence,  and  that  his  final  attitude  was  that  of  the 


242  HERMES    TRISMEGISTUS 

agnostic.  Only  Christ  holds  in  his  girdle  the  key  to 
those  mysteries,  and  to  call  him  only  a  human  being 
like  ourselves  is  to  leave  ourselves  in  mental  and  moral 
darkness.  This  poem  of  "  Hermes  Trismegistus  "  is 
one  of  the  last  which  our  poet  wrote,  and  it  shows  that 
he  needed  greater  light.  His  "  Hermes  "  is  apparently 
identical  with  himself : 

By  the  Nile  I  see  him  wandering, 

Pausing  now  and  then, 
On  the  mystic  union  pondering 

Between  gods  and  men; 
Half  believing,  wholly  feeling, 

With  supreme  delight, 
How  the  gods,  themselves  concealing, 

Lift  men  to  their  height. 

Who  shall  call  his  dreams  fallacious? 

Who  has  searched  or  sought 
All  the  unexplored  and  spacious 

Universe  of  thought? 
Who,  in  his  own  skill  confiding, 

Shall  with  rule  and  line 
Mark  the  border-land  dividing 

Human  and  divine? 

Thine,  O  priest  of  Egypt,  lately 

Found  I  in  the  vast, 
Weed-encumbered,  sombre,  stately, 

Grave-yard  of  the  Past; 
And  a  presence  moved  before  me 

On  that  gloomy  shore, 
As  a  waft  of  wind,  that  o'er  me 

Breathed,  and  was  no  more. 

Longfellow's  faith  was  simply  a  faith  in  the  his- 
toric value  of  Christ's  human  example.  This  is  a 
minor  point  in  Christian  doctrine,  yet  it  is  an  essential 


LONGFELLOW'S  "  POEMS  ON  SLAVERY  "       243 

point,  and  such  faith  as  this,  though  fragmentary,  may 
have  great  influence  over  life  and  conduct.  I  see  the 
influence  of  it  in  our  poet's  own  life,  and  in  his  writing. 
Without  this  faith,  I  doubt  whether  his  "  Poems  on 
Slavery  "  could  ever  have  been  written.  They  came 
short  of  the  fire  and  fury  which  abolitionists  like  Gar- 
rison demanded.  But  they  appealed  to  the  Christian 
conscience  on  behalf  of  the  oppressed,  and  their  very 
calmness  and  sympathy  moved  many  who,  like  Sum- 
ner,  could  not  be  revolutionists.  It  is  almost  amusing 
to  remember  that  Whittier  urged  Longfellow  to  be  a 
candidate  for  Congress,  as  he  himself  once  proposed 
to  be.  The  poet  declined,  with  the  words :  "  Partisan 
warfare  becomes  too  violent,  too  vindictive,  for  my 
taste."  He  could  praise  Channing's  denunciations  of 
slavery,  and  his  prophecies  of  its  downfall,  and  could 
entreat  him  to 

Go  on,  until  this  land  revokes 

The  old  and  chartered  Lie, 
The  feudal  curse,  whose  whips  and  yokes 

Insult  humanity. 

But  he  himself  could  better  serve  the  cause  by  such 
pathetic  verses  as  those  in  which  he  describes  the  sell- 
ing to  a  slave-dealer,  by  her  own  father,  of  "  The 
Quadroon  Girl  " : 

His  heart  within  him  was  at  strife 

With  such  accursed  gains: 
IJor  he  knew  whose  passions  gave  her  life, 

Whose  blood  ran  in  her  veins. 

But  the  voice  of  nature  was  too  weak; 

He  took  the  glittering  gold! 
Then  pale  as  death  grew  the  maiden's  cheek, 

Her  hands  as  icy  cold. 


244  "  THE    BUILDING    OF    THE    SHIP  " 

The  Slaver  led  her  from  the  door, 

He  led  her  by  the  hand, 
To  be  his  slave  and  paramour 

In  a  strange  and  distant  land. 

If  Whittier  was  our  poet  of  Liberty,  Longfellow  was 
our  poet  of  Union.  In  the  days  that  were  to  come, 
it  was  quite  as  important  that  national  solidarity  should 
be  preserved,  as  that  freedom  should  be  given  to  the 
slave.  No  utterance  in  our  literature  has  had  more 
lasting  influence  than  Longfellow's  poem,  "  The  Build- 
ing of  the  Ship."  The  closing  stanza  of  it  is  one  of  his 
noblest : 

Thou,  too,  sail  on,  O  Ship  of  State! 

Sail  on,  O  UNION,  strong  and  great! 

Humanity  with  all  its  fears, 

With  all  the  hopes  of  future  years, 

Is  hanging  breathless  on  thy  fate! 

We  know  what  Master  laid  thy  keel, 

What  Workmen  wrought  thy  ribs  of  steel, 

Who  made  each  mast,  and  sail,  and  rope, 

What  anvils  rang,  what  hammers  beat, 

In  what  a  forge  and  what  a  heat 

Were  shaped  the  anchors  of  thy  hope! 

Fear  not  each  sudden  sound  and  shock, 

'Tis  of  the  wave  and  not  the  rock; 

'Tis  but  the  flapping  of  the  sail, 

And  not  a  rent  made  by  the  gale! 

In  spite  of  rock  and  tempest's  roar, 

In  spite  of  false  lights  on  the  shore, 

Sail  on,  nor  fear  to  breast  the  sea! 

Our  hearjs,  our  hopes,  are  all  with  thee, 

Our  hearts,  our  hopes,  our  prayers,  our  tears, 

Our  faith  triumphant  o'er  our  fears, 

Are  all  with  thee, — are  all  with  thee! 

And  to  this  chant  in  praise  of  Union  must  be  added 
his  prophecy  of  universal  Peace.     "  The  Arsenal  at 


LONGFELLOW    THE    POET    OF    UNIVERSAL    PEACE    245 

Springfield  "  has  ever  since  been  quoted  by  those 
who  are  "  warlike  against  war  " : 

Down  the  dark  future,  through  long  generations, 
The  echoing  sounds  grow  fainter  and  then  cease; 

And  like  a  bell,  with  solemn,  sweet  vibrations, 

I  hear  once  more  the  voice  of  Christ  say,  "  Peace!  " 

Peace!  and  no  longer  from  its  brazen  portals 
The  blast  of  War's  great  organ  shakes  the  skies! 

But  beautiful  as  songs  of  the  immortals, 
The  holy  melodies  of  love  arise. 

The  peace  which  Longfellow  desired  was  not  simply 
peace  within  our  own  borders.  It  was  world-wide  and 
universal  peace.  He  was  not,  and  he  did  not  desire 
to  be,  a  merely  national  poet.  In  "  Kavanagh  "  he  said : 

Nationality  is  a  good  thing  to  a  certain  extent,  but  univer- 
sality is  better.  All  that  is  best  in  the  great  poets  of  all 
countries  is  not  what  is  national  in  them,  but  what  is  univer- 
sal. Their  roots  are  in  their  native  soil;  but  their  branches 
wave  in  unpatriotic  air,  that  speaks  the  same  language  to  all 
men,  and  their  leaves  shine  with  the  illimitable  light  that 
pervades  all  lands. 

In  this  somewhat  florid  and  rather  obscure  utterance 
of  his  youth,  Longfellow  wisely  held  that  the  true 
poet  appeals  to  the  universal  instincts  of  humanity.  He 
brings  men  back  to  nature.  But  can  Art  redeem? 
There  are  poems  in  which  our  poet  seems  to  intimate 
this,  and  so,  to  magnify  his  office.  "  Keramos  "  gives 
us  his  conception  of  Art : 

Art  is  the  child  of  Nature;  yes, 

Her  darling  child,  in  whom  we  trace 

The  features  of  the  mother's  face, 


246      LONGFELLOW'S  GENIUS  REPRESENTATIVE 

Her  aspect  and  her  attitude; 
All  her  majestic  loveliness 
Chastened  and  softened  and  subdued 
Into  a  more  attractive  grace, 
And  with  a  human  sense  imbued. 

He  is  the  greatest  artist,  then, 

Whether  of  pencil  or  of  pen, 

Who  follows  Nature.    Never  man, 

As  artist  or  as  artisan, 

Pursuing  his  own  fantasies, 

Can  touch  the  human  heart,  or  please, 

Or  satisfy  our  nobler  needs, 

As  he  who  sets  his  willing  feet 

In  Nature's  footprints,  light  and  fleet, 

And  follows  fearless  where  she  leads. 

To  this  we  reply  that  our  true  nature  can  be  under- 
stood and  interpreted  only  when  we  recognize  our  sin, 
and  accept  God's  remedy  for  sin  in  Christ.  The  lack  of 
this  fundamental  knowledge  makes  Longfellow's  poetry 
comparatively  weak  and  superficial.  He  deals  with 
results,  but  not  with  causes.  His  Christianity  has  no 
Cross  of  divine  sacrifice,  and  so  furnishes  no  refuge  for 
the  guilty,  and  no  dynamic  for  the  saved.  He  has  not 
grappled  with  the  deepest  problems,  and  he  cannot  stir 
the  deepest  emotions.  Creative  power  in  the  poet  is 
inseparable  from  religious  experience;  Longfellow's 
genius  therefore  is  representative  rather  than  creative ; 
he  cannot  be  ranked  with  the  great  poets  of  all  time; 
he  must  be  counted  only  the  chief  sweet  singer  of 
America. 

The  poem  entitled  "  Michael  Angelo  "  is  interesting, 
in  this  connection,  and  that  for  two  reasons.  It  is  a 
posthumous  work,  found  in  the  author's  desk  after 
his  decease,  and  it  is  almost  autobiographical.  It  cer- 


"  MICHAEL    ANGELO  "  247 

tainly  gives  us  his  latest  views  with  regard  to  the  phi- 
losophy of  art  in  general,  and  by  inference,  the  philos- 
ophy of  poetry  in  particular.  There  are  intimations 
in  it  that  our  poet  realized  the  nearness  of  his  end, 
and  was  eager  to  improve  every  passing  hour.  We  can 
hear  him  speaking,  in  the  words  he  puts  into  the  mouth 
of  the  great  painter,  sculptor,  and  architect,  as  he 
meditates  upon  the  glories  of  old  Rome: 

Malaria? 

Yes,  malaria  of  the  mind, 
Out  of  this  tomb  of  the  majestic  Past; 
The  fever  to  accomplish  some  great  work 
That  will  not  let  us  sleep.    I  must  go  on 
Until  I  die. 


How  will  men  speak  of  me  when  I  am  gone, 

When  all  this  colorless,  sad  life  is  ended, 

And  I  am  dust?    They  will  remember  only 

The  wrinkled  forehead,  the  marred  countenance, 

The  rudeness  of  my  speech,  and  my  rough  manners, 

And  never  dream  that  underneath  them  all 

There  was  a  woman's  heart  of  tenderness; 

They  will  not  know  the  secret  of  my  life, 

Locked  up  in  silence,  or  but  vaguely  hinted 

In  uncouth  rhymes,  that  may  perchance  survive 

Some  little  space  in  memories  of  men! 

Each  one  performs  his  life-work,  and  then  leaves  it; 

Those  that  come  after  him  will  estimate 

His  influence  on  the  age  in  which  he  lived. 


Not  events 

Exasperate  me,  but  the  funest  conclusions 
I  draw  from  these  events;  the  sure  decline 
Of  art,  and  all  the  meaning  of  that  word; 
All  that  embellishes  and  sweetens  life, 
And  lifts  it  from  the  level  of  low  cares 
Into  the  purer  atmosphere  of  beauty. 


248  "  MICHAEL   ANGELO  " 

In  the  "  Dedication  "  to  this  poem,  I  find  one  of  the 
best  statements  of  Longfellow's  conception  of  his-  own 
work.  He  was  rebuilding  the  ruins  of  a  noble  past, 
and  reviving  for  his  own  generation  the  beauty  and  the 
pathos  that  had  stirred  the  hearts  of  men  in  olden  time. 
This  particular  sonnet  has  a  literary  charm  which  ranks 
our  poet  among  the  most  finished  workmen  of  the 
world,  and  for  that  reason  also  I  take  pleasure  in 
quoting  it  at  length : 

Nothing  that  is  shall  perish  utterly, 
But  perish  only  to  revive  again 
In  other  forms,  as  clouds  restore  in  rain 
The  exhalations  of  the  land  and  sea. 

Men  build  their  houses  from  the  masonry 
Of  ruined  tombs;  the  passion  and  the  pain 
Of  hearts,  that  long  have  ceased  to  beat,  remain 
To  throb  in  hearts  that  are,  or  are  to  be. 

So  from  old  chronicles,  where  sleep  in  dust 

Names  that  once  filled  the  world  with  trumpet  tones, 
I  build  this  verse;  and  flowers  of  song  have  thrust 

Their  roots  among  the  loose  disjointed  stones, 
Which  to  this  end  I  fashion  as  I  must. 
Quickened  are  they  that  touch  the  Prophet's  bones. 

"  The  faith  in  the  Ideal,"  of  which  Longfellow  speaks 
in  this  poem,  was  the  faith  that  led  him  on.  The  words 
of  his  "  Michael  Angelo,"  modest  as  they  are,  seem  to 
express  his  own  modest  feeling,  as  he  looked  back  to 
his  working  days: 

Pleasantly 

Come  back  to  me  the  days  when,  as  a  youth, 
I  walked  with  Ghirlandajo  in  the  gardens 
Of  Medici,  and  saw  the  antique  statues, 
The  forms  august  of  gods  and  godlike  men, 
And  the  great  world  of  art  revealed  itself 


LONGFELLOW  AND  TENNYSON  249 

To  my  young  eyes.    Then  all  that  man  hath  done 
Seemed  possible  to  me.    Alas!  how  little 
Of  all  I  dreamed  of  has  my  hand  achieved! 

In  many  ways,  "  Michael  Angelo "  is  the  most 
mature  work  of  the  poet,  although  it  lacks  the  spon- 
taneity and  simplicity  of  his  youth.  In  learning  and 
in  thought,  he  was  never  so  well  equipped  as  when 
he  wrote  this  poem.  After  eighteen  years  of  service  in 
his  chair  at  Harvard,  he  had  resigned  his  professor- 
ship, and  had  devoted  himself  exclusively  to  poetry. 
Europe  as  well  as  America  had  come  to  recognize 
Tennyson  and  himself  as  the  two  greatest  poets  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  England  and  the  United  States 
were  united  by  a  new  tie,  when  Longfellow's  name 
became  a  household  word  in  both  countries.  He 
achieved  this  fame  and  influence  by  being,  not  provin- 
cial in  his  sympathies,  but  universal.  I  find  the  proof 
of  this  in  his  generous  estimate  of  the  works  of  others, 
and  specially  in  the  noble  tribute  which  he  renders 
to  Tennyson,  his  only  rival  in  the  suffrages  of  the  Eng- 
lish-speaking world : 

Poet!    I  come  to  touch  thy  lance  with  mine; 
Not  as  a  knight,  who  on  the  listed  field 
Of  tourney  touched  his  adversary's  shield 
In  token  of  defiance,  but  in  sign 

Of  homage  to  the  mastery,  which  is  thine, 

In  English  song;  nor  will  I  keep  concealed 
And  voiceless  as  a  rivulet  frost-congealed, 
My  admiration  for  thy  verse  divine. 

Not  of  the  howling  dervishes  of  song, 

Who  craze  the  brain  with  their  delirious  dance, 
Art  thou,  O  sweet  historian  of  the  heart! 

Therefore  to  thee  the  laurel-leaves  belong, 
To  thee  our  love  and  our  allegiance, 
For  thy  allegiance  to  the  poet's  art. 

S 


250  LONGFELLOW'S  KINDLY  SPIRIT 

Longfellow's  kindly  spirit  was  shown  in  his  recep- 
tion of  criticism.  There  was  much  to  try  a  vain  or 
rancorous  soul.  "  Hiawatha  "  was  easily  parodied, 
and  its  hero  was  dubbed  "  Milgenwatha."  Twice  our 
poet  was  accused  of  plagiarism ;  once  for  having  stolen 
the  tale  of  "  Martin  Franc,  or  the  Monk  of  St.  An- 
thony," from  George  Colman's  "  Knight  and  Friar  " ; 
and  again  by  Edgar  Allan  Poe,  for  having  passed  off 
a  ballad  of  Motherwell,  "  The  Bonnie  George  Camp- 
bell," as  his  own  translation  from  the  German.  Our 
author  replied  to  the  first  accusation  that  he  had,  with- 
out knowledge  of  Colman's  work,  simply  used  the  same 
material  that  Colman  himself  had  used.  To  the  sec- 
ond accusation,  accompanied  by  Poe's  declaration  that 
"  Longfellow  will  steal,  though  perhaps  he  cannot  help 
it,"  he  replied  that  he  had  found  the  ballad  in  a  Ger- 
man collection,  with  no  indication  of  its  being  a  trans- 
lation, and  that  he  had  simply  put  it  into  English,  with- 
out claiming  authorship.  Poe  was  informed  of  his 
error,  but  he  never  made  reparation. 

I  am  specially  interested  in  our  poet's  relations  with 
Emerson.  The  two  were  never  intimate,  though  they 
were  never  on  unfriendly  terms.  Longfellow  could  not 
sympathize  with  Emerson's  transcendentalism,  or 
with  the  disjointedness  of  his  thinking.  He  speaks  of 
Emerson's  "  Essays,"  as  "  full  of  prose  poetry,  mag- 
nificent absurdities,  and  simple  truths."  "  But  it  is 
impossible,"  he  adds,  "  to  see  any  connection  in  the 
ideas."  In  his  diary  he  writes : 

Hear  Emerson's  lecture  on  Holiness,  which  he  defines 
to  be  "  the  breath  of  the  Soul  of  the  world."  This  lecture 
is  a  great  bugbear  to  many  pious,  feeble  souls.  Not  exactly 


DEATH  OF  LONGFELLOW'S  CHILD  251 

comprehending  it  (and  who  does?)  they  seem  to  be  sitting 
in  the  shadow  of  some  awful  atheism  or  other.  .  .  This  eve- 
ning Emerson  lectured  on  the  "  Affections  ";  a  good  lecture. 
He  mistakes  his  power  somewhat,  and  at  times  speaks  in 
oracles,  darkly.  He  is  vastly  more  of  a  poet  than  a  philoso- 
pher. 

Received  from  Emerson  a  copy  of  his  Poems.  F.  read 
it  to  me  all  the  evening  and  until  late  at  night.  It  gave  us 
the  keenest  pleasure;  though  many  of  the  pieces  present 
themselves  Sphinxlike,  and,  "  struggling  to  get  free  their 
hinder-parts,"  offer  a  very  bold  front  and  challenge  your 
answer.  Throughout  the  volume,  through  the  golden  mist 
and  sublimation  of  fancy,  gleam  bright  veins  of  purest  poetry, 
like  rivers  running  through  meadows.  Truly  a  rare  volume; 
with  many  exquisite  poems  in  it,  among  which  I  should  cull 
out  "  Monadnock,"  "  Threnody,"  "  The  Humble-Bee,"  as  con- 
taining much  of  the  quintessence  of  poetry. 

Longfellow  was  a  man  of  deep  feeling,  but  he  did 
not  wear  his  heart  on  his  sleeve.  Affectionate  and 
gentle  in  his  nature,  he  could  not  be  demonstrative 
about  the  things  that  touched  him  most.  One  of  the 
most  pathetic  experiences  of  his  life  was  the  loss  of  his 
little  daughter  Fanny.  He  had  comforted  himself  with 
the  hymn : 

Give  to  the  winds  thy  fears; 

Hope,  and  be  undismayed; 
God  hears  thy  sighs  and  counts  thy  tears; 

God  shall  lift  up  thy  head. 

But  after  a  day  of  agony,  in  which  the  child  lay  motion- 
less, with  only  a  little  moan  now  and  then, 

At  half  past  four  this  afternoon  she  died.  F.  and  M.  sat 
with  me  by  her  bedside.  Her  breathing  grew  fainter,  fainter, 
then  ceased  without  a  sigh,  without  a  flutter, — perfectly  quiet, 
perfectly  painless.  The  sweetest  expression  was  on  her  face. 


252     SCANTY  MATERIAL  FOR  LONGFELLOW  S  THEOLOGY 

The  room  was  full  of  angels  where  she  lay; 
And  when  they  had  departed  she  was  gone. 

And  a  full  month  after,  he  writes  in  his  diary  : 

I  feel  very  sad  to-day.  I  miss  very  much  my  dear  little 
Fanny.  An  inappeasable  longing  to  see  her  comes  over  me 
at  times,  which  I  can  hardly  control. 

It  is  not  to  be  expected  that  we  should  find,  either 
in  his  prose  or  in  his  poetry,  any  very  definite  state- 
ments of  his  theological  or  religious  beliefs.  He  was 
no  dogmatist  —  he  rather  doubted  the  possibility  of 
expressing  the  mysterious  relations  of  the  finite  spirit 
with  the  infinite  Spirit  from  whom  it  came,  and  in 
whom  it  lives.  If  he  had  had  a  more  pronounced  be- 
lief in  the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures,  or  had  had  a 
more  profound  Christian  experience,  he  could  have  left 
to  us  more  material  from  which  to  construct  his  theo- 
logical system.  Both  Bryant  and  Whittier  have  given 
us  many  hymns  for  our  Christian  worship.  Longfel- 
low is  not  so  prolific.  But  who  can  fail  to  recognize 
the  Christian  spirit  of  his  early  poem,  "  Blind  Bar- 
timeus  "  ? 

Blind  Bartimeus  at  the  gates 
Of  Jericho  in  darkness  waits; 
He  hears  the  crowd;  —  he  hears  a  breath 
Say,  "  It  is  Christ  of  Nazareth!  " 
And  calls,  in  tones  of  agony, 
fis  ! 


The  thronging  multitudes  increase; 
Blind  Bartimeus,  hold  thy  peace! 
But  still,  above  the  noisy  c.owd, 
The   beggar's  cry  is  shrill  and  loud; 
Until  they  say,  "  He  calleth  thee!  " 


CHRISTIAN    SPIRIT    OF   LONGFELLOW^    POEMS    253 

Then  saith  the  Christ,  as  silent  stands 
The  crowd,  "  What  wilt  thou  at  my  hands?  " 
And  he  replies,  "  Oh,  give  me  light! 
Rabbi,  restore  the  blind  man's  sight!" 
And  Jesus  answers,  "Ynays  • 


Ye  that  have  eyes,  yet  cannot  see, 
In  darkness  and  in  misery, 
Recall  those  mighty  Voices  Three, 


0dpff£i,  systpat,  uTraye  / 
'H  itiffTis  sou  aiatuxi  ff£  / 


I  know  of  no  poet  who  has  written  so  little  that 
is  professedly  Christian,  and  whose  poetry  is  not- 
withstanding so  shot  through  and  through  with  the 
Christian  spirit.  It  seems  as  if  the  same  Saviour  who 
had  cleansed  him  had  also  bidden  him,  "  See  that 
thou  tell  no  man  !  "  He  had  undoubtedly  a  prejudice 
against  a  forthputting  and  demonstrative  evangelicism. 
But  the  atmosphere  of  his  poems  is  the  atmosphere  of 
gospel  truth.  There  is  a  tenderness  and  compassion 
not  to  be  found  in  pagan  or  agnostic  literature.  The 
last  stanza  of  "  Christus  "  best  expresses  the  inner- 
most thought  of  the  poet: 

From  all  vain  pomps  and  shows, 

From  the  pride  that  overflows, 

And  the  false  conceits  of  men; 

From  all  the  narrow  rules 

And  subtleties  of  Schools, 

And  the  craft  of  tongue  and  pen; 

Bewildered  in  its  search, 

Bewildered  with  the  cry: 

Lo,  here!  lo,  there,  the  Church! 

Poor,  sad  Humanity 

Through  all  the  dust  and  heat 


254        LONGFELLOW'S  FAITH  IN  PROVIDENCE 

Turns  back  with  bleeding  feet, 
By  the  weary  road  it  came, 
Unto  the  simple  thought 
By  the  great  Master  taught, 
And  that  remaineth  still: 
Not  he  that  repeateth  the  name, 
But  he  that  doeth  the  will! 

I  am  persuaded  that  in  the  First  Interlude  of  "  Chris- 
tus,"  our  poet  is  in  like  manner  expressing  his  own 
religious  convictions: 

My  work  is  finished;  I  am  strong 
In  faith,  and  hope,  and  charity; 
For  I  have  written  the  things  I  see, 
The  things  that  have  been  and  shall  be, 
Conscious  of  right,  nor  fearing  wrong; 
Because  I  am  in  love  with  Love, 
And  the  sole  thing  I  hate  is  Hate; 
For  Hate  is  death;  and  Love  is  life, 
A  peace,  a  splendor  from  above; 
And  Hate,  a  never-ending  strife, 
A  smoke,  a  blackness  from  the  abyss 
Where  unclean  serpents  coil  and  hiss! 
Love  is  the  Holy  Ghost  within; 
Hate  the  unpardonable  sin! 
Who  preaches  otherwise  than  this, 
Betrays  his  Master  with  a  kiss! 

This  is  not  Epicureanism  or  Stoicism,  but  faith  in 
an  overruling  divine  Providence,  and  in  the  Christ  who 
has  manifested  God  to  men.  On  a  visit  to  his  old 
home  in  Portland,  he  wrote,  in  his  diary,  of  the  sil- 
very reflection  of  the  moonlight  on  the  sea: 

Among  other  thoughts  we  had  this  cheering  one,  that  the 
whole  sea  was  flashing  with  this  heavenly  light,  though  we 
saw  it  only  in  a  single  track;  the  dark  waves  are  the  dark 
providences  of  God;  luminous,  though  not  to  us;  and  even  to 
ourselves  in  another  position. 


"  MORITURI    SALUTAMUS  "  255 

I  am  therefore  not  willing  to  take  the  closing  words 
of  "  Michael  Angelo  "  as  the  final  expression  of  the 
poet's  feeling  in  view  of  his  approaching  end.  "  Michael 
Angelo"  is  called,  in  its  very  title,  "A  Fragment"; 
and  it  was  unfinished  at  the  poet's  death.  It  certainly 
gives  us  a  dark  picture  of  unfulfilled  ambition : 

Life  hath  become  to  me 
An  empty  theater, — its  lights  extinguished, 
The  music  silent,  and  the  actors  gone; 
And  I  alone  sit  musing  on  the  scenes 
That  once  have  been.    I  am  so  old  that  Death 
Oft  plucks  me  by  the  cloak,  to  come  with  him; 
And  some  day,  like  this  lamp,  shall  I  fall  down, 
And  my  last  spark  of  life  will  be  extinguished. 
Ah  me!  ah  me!  what  darkness  of  despair! 
So  near  to  death,  and  yet  so  far  from  God! 

"  Morituri  Salutamus  "  is  a  notable  poem,  both  for 
its  occasion  and  for  its  expression  of  Longfellow's 
thoughts  in  view  of  death.  Its  title  is  the  words  of  the 
Roman  gladiators,  as  they  came  to  their  final  fight  in 
the  arena.  It  was  written  for  the  fiftieth  anniversary 
of  his  college  class,  and  it  was  actually  delivered  be- 
fore them: 

"  O  Caesar,  we  who  are  about  to  die 
Salute  you!"  was  the  gladiators'  cry 
In  the  arena,  standing  face  to  face  « 

With  death  and  with  the  Roman  populace. 


Young  men,  whose  generous  hearts  are  beating  high, 
We  who  are  old,  and  are  about  to  die, 
Salute  you;  hail  you;  take  your  hands  in  ours, 
And  crown  you  with  our  welcome  as  with  flowers. 


256      LONGFELLOW'S  BELIEF  IN  IMMORTALITY 

What  then?     Shall  we  sit  idly  down  and  say 
The  night  hath  come;  it  is  no  longer  day? 
The  night  hath  not  yet  come;  we  are  not  quite 
Cut  off  from  labor  by  the  failing  light; 
Something  remains  for  us  to  do  or  dare; 
Even  the  oldest  tree  some  fruit  may  bear; 
Not  CEdipus  Coloneus,  or  Greek  Ode, 
Or  tales  of  pilgrims  that  one  morning  rode 
Out  of  the  gateway  of  the  Tabard  Inn, 
But  other  something,  would  we  but  begin; 
For  age  is  opportunity  no  less 
Than  youth  itself,  though  in  another  dress, 
And  as  the  evening  twilight  fades  away 
The  sky  is  filled  with  stars,  invisible  by  day. 

When  he  revisited  Brunswick  in  the  summer  of  1875, 
he  wrote  a  sonnet  as  he  viewed  the  funeral-stone  that 
marked  the  resting-place  of  Parker  Cleaveland,  one  of 
the  best  of  his  early  friends.  The  closing  lines  of  that 
sonnet  declare  Longfellow's  firm  belief  in  immortality : 

With  fond  affection  memory  loves  to  dwell 
On  the  old  days,  when  his  example  made 
A  pastime  of  the  toil  of  tongue  and  pen; 
And  now,  amid  the  groves  he  loved  so  well 

That  naught  could  lure  him  from  their  grateful 

shade, 

He  sleeps,  but  wakes  elsewhere,  for  God  hath 
said,  Amen! 

And  yet  I  turn  to  Longfellow's  earliest  poems  for 
my  clearest  proofs  that  he  believed  in  another  life  be- 
yond the  grave.  In  his  later  years  he  grew  more 
thoughtful,  but  also  more  reticent,  with  regard  to  the 
great  problems  of  existence.  The  day  for  easygoing 
faith  had  passed.  Controversy  had  raged  around  him. 
He  had  little  interest  in  theological  discussion — it 
seemed  to  him  of  less  importance  to  define  what  is  be- 


"  THE    BELEAGUERED    CITY  "  257 

yond  us,  than  to  practise  what  we  already  know.  But 
he  would  have  been  more  or  less  than  human,  if  he  had 
been  unaffected  by  the  strife.  It  made  him  less  and 
less  inclined  to  dogmatic  utterance,  or  to  express  the 
deepest  feelings  of  his  soul.  The  poems  of  his  early 
days,  however,  were  never  withdrawn  or  disavowed ; 
and  they  remain  to  us  as  spontaneous  and  genuine  ex- 
pressions of  religious  feeling  though  they  are  entirely 
free  from  hackneyed  phraseology  and  from  sentimen- 
tal exaggeration.  In  "  The  Beleaguered  City "  he 
wrote : 

I  have  read,  in  the  marvellous  heart  of  man, 

That  strange  and  mystic  scroll, 
That  an  army  of  phantoms  vast  and  wan 

Beleaguer  the  human  soul. 


And,  when  the  solemn  and  deep  church-bell 

Entreats  the  soul  to  pray, 
The  midnight  phantoms  feel  the  spell, 

The  shadows  sweep  away. 

Down  the  broad  Vale  of  Tears  afar 

The  spectral  camp  is  fled; 
Faith  shineth  as  a  morning  star, 

Our  ghastly  fears  are  dead. 

If  we  seek  evidence  of  our  poet's  belief  in  an  im- 
mortal life  beyond  the  grave,  we  may  find  it  in  that 
"  Psalm  of  Life "  which,  more  than  any  other  of 
Longfellow's  poems,  drew  to  him  first  of  all  the  ad- 
miration and  affection  of  his  youthful  contemporaries : 

Tell  me  not,  in  mournful  numbers, 

Life  is  but  an  empty  dream! — 
For  the  soul  is  dead  that  slumbers, 

And  things  are  not  what  they  seem. 


258  "  THE    LIGHT    OF    STARS  " 

Life  is  real!    Life  is  earnest! 

And  the  grave  is  not  its  goal; 
Dust  thou  art,  to  dust  returnest, 

Was  not  spoken  of  the  soul. 

In  "  The  Reaper  and  the  Flowers,"  he  comforts  the 
mother  who  has  lost  her  child : 

There  is  a  Reaper,  whose  name  is  Death, 

And;  with  his  sickle  keen, 
He  reaps  the  bearded  grain  at  a  breath, 

And  the  flowers  that  grow  between. 

"  My  Lord,  has  need  of  these  flowerets  gay," 

The  Reaper  said,  and  smiled; 
"  Dear  tokens  of  the  earth  are  they, 
Where  He  was  once  a  child." 

And  the  mother  gave,  in  tears  and  pain, 

The  flowers  she  most  did  love; 
She  knew  she  should  find  them  all  again 

In  the  fields  of  light  above. 

"  The  Light  of  Stars  "  witnesses  that  even  in  the  midst 
of  earthly  losses  and  trials  the  soul  may  be  hopeful 
and  quiet : 

The  star  of  the  unconquered  will, 

He  rises  in  my  breast, 
Serene,  and  resolute,  and  still, 

And  calm,  and  self-possessed. 

And  thou,  too,  whosoe'er  thou  art, 

That  readest  this  brief  psalm, 
As  one  by  one  thy  hopes  depart, 

Be  resolute  and  calm. 

Oh,  fear  not  in  a  world  like  this, 

And  thou  shalt  know  ere  long, 
Know  how  sublime  a  thing  it  is 

To  suffer  and  be  strong. 


"  COPLAS   DE    MANRIQUE  "  259 

"  Flowers  "  teach  lessons  of  symbolic  lore  to  those  who 
can  read  them : 

Spake  full  well,  in  language  quaint  and  olden, 
One  who  dwelleth  by  the  castled  Rhine, 

When  he  called  the  flowers,  so  blue  and  golden, 
Stars,  that  in  earth's  firmament  do  shine. 


Wondrous  truths,  and  manifold  as  wondrous, 
God  hath  written  in  those  stars  above; 

But  not  less  in  the  bright  flowerets  under  us 
Stands  the  revelation  of  his  love. 


And  the  Poet,  faithful  and  far-seeing, 
Sees,  alike  in  stars  and  flowers,  a  part 

Of  the  self-same,  universal  being, 
Which  is  throbbing  in  his  brain  and  heart. 

And  with  childlike,  credulous  affection, 
We  behold  their  tender  buds  expand; 

Emblems  of  our  own  great  resurrection, 
Emblems  of  the  bright  and  better  land. 

Longfellow  translated  from  other  languages  many 
poems  which  he  would  not  have  ventured  to  write  in 
his  own  name.  What  shall  we  say  of  the  verses  in 
"  Coplas  de  Manrique  "  which  follow  ? 

To  One  alone  my  thoughts  arise, 

The  Eternal  Truth,  the  Good  and  Wise, 

To  Him  I  cry, 

Who  shared  on  earth  our  common  lot, 

But  the  world  comprehended  not 

His  deity. 


Yes,  the  glad  messenger  of  love, 
To  guide  us  to  our  home  above, 


26O  "  SONG   OF   THE    SILENT   LAND  " 

The  Saviour  came; 
Born  amid  mortal  cares  and  fears, 
He  suffered  in  this  vale  of  tears 
A  death  of  shame. 


"  O  thou,  that  for  our  sins  didst  take 
A  human  form,  and  humbly  make 
Thy  home  on  earth; 
Thou,  .that  to  thy  divinity 
A  human  nature  didst  ally 
By  mortal  birth, 

"  And  in  that  form  didst  suffer  here 
Torment,  and  agony,  and  fear, 
So  patiently; 

By  thy  redeeming  grace  alone, 
And  not  for  merits  of  my  own, 
Oh,  pardon  me! " 

And  what  shall  we  say  of  such  sweet  and  reposeful 
words  as  those  in  which  our  poet  has  translated,  from 
the  German  of  Salis-Seewis,  his  "  Song  of  the  Silent 
Land  "  ? 

Into  the  Silent  Land! 

Ah!  who  shall  lead  us  thither? 

Clouds  in  the  evening  sky  more  darkly  gather, 

And  shattered  wrecks  lie  thicker  on  the  strand. 

Who  leads  us  with  a  gentle  hand 

Thither,  oh,  thither, 

Into  the  Silent  Land? 

Into  the  Silent  Land! 

To  you,  ye  boundless  regions 

Of  all  perfection!    Tender  morning-visions 

Of  beauteous  souls!    The  Future's  pledge  and  band! 

Who  in  Life's  battle  firm  doth  stand, 

Shall  bear  Hope's  tender  blossoms 

Into  the  Silent  Land. 


LIMITS  OF  LONGFELLOW'S  THEOLOGY         261 

O  Land!     O  Land! 

For  all  the  broken-hearted 

The  mildest  herald  by  our  fate  allotted, 

Beckons,  and  with  inverted  torch  doth  stand 

To  lead  us  with  a  gentle  hand 

To  the  land  of  the  great  Departed, 

Into  the  Silent  Land. 

These  translations  show  a  comprehensive  apprecia- 
tion of  other  faiths,  even  if  they  do  not  show  the  drift 
of  the  poet's  own  beliefs.  His  kindly  and  sympathetic 
nature  entered  into  the  feelings  of  others,  and  inter- 
preted them  as  efforts  to  grasp  and  express  the  truth. 
"  He  that  is  not  against  us  is  for  us,"  might  have  been 
his  motto.  He  was  a  poet  of  humanity,  but  not  of 
divinity.  Humanity,  to  some  extent,  indeed,  reveals 
divinity.  Unfortunately,  our  present  humanity  is 
neither  normal  nor  true.  It  is  only  a  partial  revela- 
tion of  God.  We  need  the  perfect  humanity  of  Christ 
to  instruct  us;  and,  without  knowledge  of  our  sin,  we 
cannot  fully  appreciate  him.  Longfellow  did  see  Christ, 
in  some  of  his  most  winning  attributes ;  and,  because  of 
this  vision  of  a  human  ideal,  he  could  interpret  a  peo- 
ple's heart,  and  could  win  their  love.  He  would  have 
been  a  greater  poet,  if  he  had  apprehended  Christ's 
divine  nature,  his  revelation  of  God's  righteousness, 
and  his  atonement  for  our  sin.  But  he  saw  the  beauty 
and  the  pathos  of  life.  The  gentle  and  tender  elements 
in  humanity  he  could  appropriate  and  express.  The 
background  of  divine  holiness,  which  would  have  made 
life  more  solemn  and  significant,  was  beyond  his  ken. 

Like  Bryant,  Longfellow  found  diversion  and  solace, 
after  the  death  of  his  wife,  in  translating  one  of  the 
great  poets.  But  while  Bryant  took  Homer,  Long- 


262       LONGFELLOW'S  TRANSLATION  OF  DANTE 

fellow  dealt  with  Dante.  It  would  at  first  sight  appear 
incongruous  that  so  sweet  and  mellow  a  poet  should 
put  into  English  the  horrors  of  the  "  Inferno  " ;  and 
we  must  confess  that  Rossetti  has,  in  that  part  of 
"  The  Divine  Comedy,"  achieved  a  greater  triumph 
than  has  Longfellow.  But  it  can  be  said  for  our  poet, 
that  the  smoothness  and  melody  of  the  terza-rima 
found  in  him  a  grateful  response,  and  he  loved  the 
very  softness  with  which  Dante  clothes  his  images  of 
terror.  It  is  also  true  that  Longfellow  looked  beneath 
the  surface,  and  perceived  that  even  Dante  had  no 
thought  of  mere  physical  torment  as  constituting  the 
essences  of  punishment,  either  in  this  world  or  in  the 
next ;  the  "  Inferno  "  is  only  a  vast  allegory,  which 
describes  eternal  pangs  of  conscience  under  the  figure 
of  literal  fire.  So  our  poet  could  see,  even  in  eternal 
suffering,  the  discipline  of  eternal  love.  All  this  be- 
comes more  manifest  in  his  versions  of  the  "  Purga- 
torio  "  and  of  the  "  Paradise."  Here  Longfellow's 
style  favors  his  subject,  and  critics  have  declared  his 
work  to  be  without  a  superior,  in  faithful  rendering 
of  both  the  substance  and  the  form  of  the  original. 
We  can  easily  imagine  the  old  man  eloquent,  cheering 
his  days,  as  he  drew  near  his  end,  with  the  spiritual 
and  soul-subduing  strains  of  Dante's  "  Purgatory  "  and 
"  Paradise." 

Our  poet  was  sunny  and  genial  to  the  last,  though 
he  was  afflicted  with  rheumatism,  and  his  days  were 
never  free  from  pain.  When  confined  to  his  room,  he 
delighted  to  receive  and  to  entertain  children.  Charles 
Kingsley  declared  that  his  "  face  was  the  most  beau- 
tiful he  had  ever  seen,"  It  was  the  noble  expression 


LONGFELLOW  A  POET  OF  THE  ENGLISH  RACE     263 

of  a  noble  soul.  When  he  died  in  1882,  at  the  age  of 
seventy-five,  America  mourned  his  loss,  as  it  had 
mourned  the  loss  of  no  other  of  its  literary  sons. 
And  the  mourning  was  not  confined  to  our  own  land. 
In  the  Poets'  Corner  of  Westminster  Abbey,  the  bust 
of  only  one  American  has  a  place.  It  is  the  bust  of 
Henry  Wadsworth  Longfellow.  The  benignant  coun- 
tenance looks  down  upon  the  tomb  of  Chaucer,  and  is 
midway  between  the  memorials  to  Cowley  and  to 
Dryden.  Its  admission  to  that  Valhalla  is  proof  that 
Longfellow  was  recognized  not  simply  as  an  American 
poet,  but  also  as  a  poet  of  our  whole  English-speaking 
race.  Another  monument,  less  public  but  more  affect- 
ing, is  the  tribute  which  James  Russell  Lowell  wrote 
on  Longfellow's  sixtieth  birthday,  and  which  sums  up 
most  admirably  the  spirit  of  his  life  and  work: 

"  I  need  not  praise  the  sweetness  of  his  song, 

Where  limpid  verse  to  limpid  verse  succeeds 
Smooth  as  our  Charles,  when,  fearing  lest  he  wrong 
The  new  moon's  mirrored  skiff,  he  glides  along, 
Full  without  noise,  and  whispers  in  his  reeds. 

"  With  loving  breath  of  all  the  winds  his  name 
Is  blown  about  the  world,  but  to  his  friends 
A  sweeter  secret  hides  behind  his  fame, 
And  Love  steals  shyly  through  the  loud  acclaim 
To  murmur  a  God  bless  you!  and  there  ends." 


VI 

JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 


JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 


JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL  is  our  chief  poetical  moral- 
ist. Not  our  greatest  poet;  for,  in  simplicity  and 
range  of  sentiment,  Longfellow  excels  him.  He  is 
not  a  melodist,  like  Poe;  nor  a  politician,  like  Whit- 
tier;  nor  a  somber  lover  of  nature,  like  Bryant  But 
ethics  is  bred  in  the  very  bone.  From  early  manhood, 
abstract  right  fired  his  imagination,  took  the  place  of 
divinity  as  a  study,  became  the  real  subject  of  all  his 
poetry.  In  two  respects,  Lowell  made  his  work  an 
important  contribution  to  human  progress :  On  the  one 
hand,  he  added  wit  and  humor  to  the  forces  of  reform ; 
and,  on  the  other  hand,  his  breadth  and  sanity  of  judg- 
ment in  politics  and  literature  gave  enduring  value  to 
his  criticism.  Yet  he  was  hampered  by  the  brilliancy 
of  his  genius.  He  was  so  fertile  in  ideas  that  images 
ran  over  one  another  in  his  brain  and  entangled  his 
expression  of  them.  Only  in  occasional  snatches  do  we 
find  pure  poetry.  But  the  sincerity  of  the  man  makes 
all  his  writing  impressive.  To  him  literature  was  a 
ministry;  and  he  could  always,  without  rebuke,  apply 
to  himself  the  poet's  words : 

"  He  serves  the  Muses  erringly  and  ill, 
Whose  aim  is  pleasure,  light  and  fugitive." 

Lowell  was  a  typical  man  of  letters ;  but,  with  all  his 
wit  and  humor,  he  was  a  profoundly  serious  writer. 

267 


268     PARENTAGE  AND  BOYHOOD  OF  LOWELL 

His  ethics  took  the  form  of  patriotism.  There  never 
was  a  more  complete  American.  He  put  his  literary 
gifts  at  the  service  of  his  country  and  of  humanity.  He 
gloried  in  our  national  greatness,  while  at  the  same 
time  he  recognized  and  labored  to  cure  our  national 
defects.  His  poetry  greatly  helped  the  cause  of  free- 
dom and  unity  in  the  time  of  our  Civil  War.  It  is 
an  interesting  coincidence  that  he  was  born  on  the 
twenty-second  of  February,  1819,  just  eighty-seven 
years  after  the  birth  of  George  Washington.  George 
William  Curtis  calls  attention  to  this  fact;  and,  as 
illustrations  of  patriotic  service,  he  blends  the  names 
of  Lowell  and  of  Washington  together. 

The  father  of  our  poet  was  a  clergyman  of  literary 
tastes,  and  of  a  benignant  disposition.  His  mother 
had  in  her  nature  a  tincture  of  romance.  James  was 
her  youngest  child,  and  her  darling.  Handsome  and 
affectionate,  he  responded  to  her  admiration  of  fields 
and  flowers,  and  to  her  stories  of  heroism  on  land  and 
sea.  The  father  took  the  boy  with  him,  in-  his  long 
journeys  in  the  one-horse  chaise,  whenever  he  made 
his  frequent  exchange  of  pulpits  with  ministers  of  the 
neighboring  towns.  Eastern  Massachusetts  had  then 
an  almost  unmixed  native  population.  Then  and  there 
could  be  heard  the  genuine  Yankee  dialect.  Lowell 
declared  in  after  years  that,  of  all  languages  on  the 
face  of  the  earth,  he  was  most  certain  that  he  knew 
the  Yankee;  and  it  is  probable  that  these  clerical  in- 
roads into  the  country  gave  to  the  susceptible  and  f  un- 
loving child  the  inimitable  vocabulary  and  grammar 
which  "  The  Biglow  Papers  "  afterward  immortalized. 

The  bright  boy  was  a  lover  of  books ;  but  he  loved 


LOWELL   AT    COLLEGE  269 

regular  study  and  discipline  much  less.  It  was  well 
for  him  that  William  Wells,  an  Englishman,  "  of  good 
breeding  as  well  as  good  learning,"  taught  him  his 
Latin.  Lowell  never  lost  the  benefit  of  that  severe  in- 
struction. His  favorite  occupation,  however,  was  his 
voluntary  and  miscellaneous  foraging  in  fields  of  Eng- 
lish literature.  When  he  entered  Harvard  College  at 
the  age  of  fifteen,  he  was  widely  read.  In  his  sopho- 
more year  he  writes  to  a  friend  that  Milton  has  excited 
his  "  ambition  to  read  all  the  Greek  and  Latin  clas- 
sics which  he  " — that  is,  Milton  himself — "  did."  The 
same  letter  shows  that  Lowell  had  more  than  ordinary 
acquaintance  with  the  Satires  of  Horace,  as  well  as  the 
Bucolics  of  Vergil.  Butler's  "  Hudibras,"  Beattie's 
"  Minstrel,"  together  with  Akenside,  Byron,  Cole- 
ridge, Cowley,  Pope,  and  Spenser,  are  casually  men- 
tioned as  parts  of  his  English  acquisitions.  The  mathe- 
matics of  the  regular  course,  however,  did  not  attract 
him.  He  was  somewhat  neglectful  of  college  prayers. 
Popular  with  his  classmates,  he  was  not  equally  popu- 
lar with  the  faculty.  In  fact,  though  chosen  by  his 
class  as  their  poet,  he  was  not  permitted  by  the  author- 
ities to  deliver  his  poem,  or  even  to  graduate.  For  sev- 
eral months  he  was  suspended  from  all  college  exercises, 
and  was  required  to  absent  himself  from  the  neighbor- 
hood of  the  institution.  Mr.  Norton,  however,  relates 
that  "  in  the  autumn,  having  received  his  degree  with 
his  classmates,  he  returned  to  his  home  in  Cambridge." 
Reflection  upon  his  waywardness,  and  upon  the  sor- 
row it  caused  to  his  parents,  was  apparently  the  turn- 
ing-point in  his  career.  He  spent  his  days  of  "  rus- 
tication "  in  Concord,  where  he  met  Emerson,  of  whom 


27O        LOWELL  S   LITERARY   AND   ETHICAL   BENT 

he  writes :  "  He  is  a  good-natured  man,  in  spite  of  his 
doctrines."  Up  to  this  time  Lowell  was  neither  a 
transcendentalist  nor  an  abolitionist.  The  class-poem, 
which  he  wrote  in  Concord  and  distributed  to  his  class- 
mates in  print  after  their  graduation,  speaks  rather 
slightingly  of  both  these  great  movements  of  the  time. 
But  he  was  gradually  and  unconsciously  changing.  He 
accuses  himself  of  indolence  and  of  dreaming.  He 
reads  Blackstone,  but  soon  renounces  the  law: 

They  tell  me  I  must  study  law. 

They  say  that  I  have  dreamed,  and  dreamed  too  long; 

That  I  must  rouse,  and  seek  for  fame  and  gold; 
That  I  must  scorn  this  idle  gift  of  song, 

And  mingle  with  the  vain  and  proud  and  cold. 
Is  then  this  petty  strife 
The  end  and  aim  of  life, 
All  that  is  worth  the  living  for  below? 
O  God,  then  call  me  hence,  for  I  would  gladly  go! 

Literature  is  his  real  idol.  Yet  increasing  maturity 
gives  to  his  thoughts  an  ethical  bent.  He  aims  to  write 
a  poem  on  Cromwell,  whom  he  admires  more  than  he 
admires  the  dashing  Cavaliers.  He  becomes  "  ultra- 
democratic  " ;  calls  the  Church  of  England  an  "  in- 
cubus " ;  declares  that  the  abolitionists  are  the  only 
party  with  which  he  sympathizes.  He  thinks  seriously 
of  going  into  the  divinity  school,  as  a  preparation  for 
the  ministry;  but  he  gives  this  up,  for  the  reason  that 
he  has  not  money  enough  to  be  independent,  as  a  min- 
ister ought  to  be.  He  records  a  vow  to  read  a  chapter 
in  the  Bible  every  night.  "  Only  fools,"  he  says,  "  de- 
spise religion."  But  he  cares  little  for  outward  re- 
ligious observances : 


LOWELL'S  MARRIAGE  DIRECTS  HIS  GENIUS     271 

What  is  religion?    'Tis  to  go 

To  church  one  day  in  seven, 
And  think  that  we,  of  all  men,  know 

The  only  way  to  heaven. 

But  he  that  hath  found,  as  the  holy  apostle  did  at  Athens 
of  the  heathens,  an  altar  to  the  unknown  God  in  his  heart, 
and  who  in  a  spirit  of  love  and  wonder  offereth  up  accept- 
able offerings  thereon  in  the  Temple  of  Nature,  doth  not  he, 
of  the  twain,  walk  with  God? 


This  turmoil  and  uncertainty  are  signs  of  a  vigor- 
ous mind,  eager  for  action,  and  desirous  of  doing  the 
best  that  is  possible;  but  they  also  show  that  as  yet 
Lowell  is  little  acquainted  with  his  own  powers  or 
with  the  needs  of  the  world.  Out  of  this  seething 
caldron,  however,  there  slowly  rises  the  shape  of  a 
definite  ambition — an  ambition  that  masters  him  and 
compels  his  following  through  all  his  after-life : 

Above  all  things  should  I  love  to  be  able  to  sit  down  and  do 
something  literary  for  the  rest  of  my  natural  life.  .  .  Before 
I  die,  your  heart  shall  be  gladdened  by  seeing  your  wayward, 
vain,  and  too  often  selhsh  friend  do  something  that  shall 
make  his  name  honored.  As  Sheridan  once  said,  "  It's  in  me, 
and"  (we'll  skip  the  oath)  "it  shall  come  out!"  I  shall  let 
my  fate  be  governed  by  circumstance  and  influence.  .  .  A 
man  should  regard  not  only  what  is  in  him,  but  also  what  is 
without,  acting  on  that  within. 

It  is  doubtful  whether  this  ambition  would  have  been 
absorbingly  ethical,  as  well  as  literary,  if  his  marriage 
to  Miss  Maria  White  had  not  directed  his  genius  to 
the  highest  aims.  She  had  been  his  next-door  neigh- 
bor and  his  playmate  from  their  childhood ;  she  had 
poetical  gifts  which  Lowell  delighted  to  recognize;  she 


272  "  A  YEAR'S  LIFE  " 

was  beautiful  in  person,  calm  and  commanding  in  man- 
ner; above  all,  her  moral  nature  ruled,  and  she  sym- 
pathized with  every  righteous  and  suffering  cause.  She 
stimulated  the  moral  impulses  of  her  husband,  and 
turned  what  might  have  been  merely  light  literature 
into  a  mighty  influence  for  reform. 

The  woman's  influence  in  this  case  was  so  .great  that 
we  may  be  pardoned  for  introducing  here  the  dedica- 
tion of  Lowell's  first  book  of  poems,  published  in  1841, 
and  entitled  "  A  Year's  Life."  It  was  addressed,  really 
though  not  formally,  to  his  future  bride: 

The  gentle  Una  have  I  loved, 
The  snowy  maiden,  pure  and  mild, 
Since  ever  by  her  side  I  roved 
Through  ventures  strange,  a  wondering 

child, 

In  fantasy  a  Red  Cross  Knight 
Burning  for  her  dear  sake  to  fight. 

If  there  be  one  who  can,  like  her, 
Make  sunshine  in  life's  shady  places, 
One  in  whose  holy  bosom  stir 
As  many  gentle  household  graces, — 
And  such  I  think  there  needs  must  be, — 
Will  she  accept  this  book  from  me? 

The  little  book  was  full  of  allusions  to  his  inamorata. 
One  of  its  poems  was  indeed  an  elaborate  and  long 
drawn-out  description  of  her.  "  Irene,"  in  spite  of  its 
youthful  effervescence,  is  a  production  of  much  prom- 
ise; and,  as  disclosing  one  of  the  great  influences  that 
shaped  his  mental  and  moral  development,  it  deserves 
our  special  attention.  I  quote  only  its  first  and  last 
stanzas : 


EARLY    STRAITS   AND    BEREAVEMENTS  2/3 

Hers  is  a  spirit  deep,  and  crystal-clear; 
Calmly  beneath  her  earnest  face  it  lies, 
Free  without  boldness,  meek  without  a  fear, 
Quicker  to  look  than  speak  its  sympathies; 
Far  down  into  her  large  and  patient  eyes 
I  gaze,  deep-drinking  of  the  infinite, 
As,  in  the  mid-watch  of  a  clear,  still  night, 
I  look  into  the  fathomless  blue  skies. 

Like  a  lone  star  through  riven  storm-clouds  seen 
By  sailors,  tempest-tost  upon  the  sea, 
Telling  of  rest  and  peaceful  heavens  nigh, 
Unto  my  soul  her  star-like  soul  hath  been, 
Her  sight  as  full  of  hope  and  calm  to  me; — 
For  she  unto  herself  hath  builded  high 
A  home  serene,  wherein  to  lay  her  head, 
Earth's  noblest  thing,  a  Woman  perfected. 

The  poet  had  need  of  a  patient  and  strong  com- 
panion, for  his  father's  loss  of  property  made  marriage 
impracticable  for  three  whole  years,  and  threw  him 
after  his  graduation  from  college  entirely  upon  his 
own  resources.  He  lived  on  the  meager  returns  of 
hack-work  for  newspapers  and  magazines ;  and,  since 
these  gave  him  no  more  than  four  hundred  dollars 
yearly,  he  was  often  in  real  straits  for  money.  When 
at  last,  in  December,  1844,  he  married,  the  pair  lived 
for  a  twelvemonth  on  less  than  one  thousand  dollars, 
although  from  the  first  the  wife  was  frail  in  health. 
Their  married  life  was  not  free  from  sorrow.  In  1847 
death  took  from  them  their  little  daughter  Blanche, 
and  in  1850  their  daughter  Rose.  In  this  latter  year 
they  were  made  happy  by  the  birth  of  a  beautiful  son, 
Walter;  but  he  too  died  during  their  tour  in  Italy  in 
1852.  Mrs.  Lowell  never  recovered  from  these  dread- 
ful blows,  and  she  followed  her  children  in  1853. 


274        LOWELLS    BRILLIANCY   AND    VERSATILITY 

Lowell's  financial  circumstances  had  so  improved 
that  he  could  go  abroad  with  his  family.  But  sorrow 
did  its  work;  his  writing  gained  in  depth  and  sym- 
pathy; he  braced  himself,  not  only  to  meet  whatever 
might  come  to  him  individually,  but  to  stand  for  truth 
and  right  in  public  affairs.  The  spirit  of  his  wife 
influenced  him,  not  only  while  she  lived,  but  long  after 
her  departure.  What  has  been  well  called  "  the  steady 
and  relentless  progress  of  the  slave-power  "  challenged 
his  abhorrence  and  his  opposition.  As  early  as  1846 
he  engaged  to  write  for  "  The  Anti-slavery  Standard  " 
a  weekly  contribution  in  prose  or  verse,  and  this  for  a 
pitiful  five  hundred  dollars  a  year.  This  connection 
lasted  for  four  years.  His  work  was  not  exclusively 
reformatory.  Some  of  his  poems,  like  "  Eurydice  " 
and  "  The  Parting  of  the  Ways,"  were  revelations  of 
his  inner  life.  In  "  The  Boston  Miscellany  "  he  wrote 
on  "  The  Old  English  Dramatists " — and  began  a 
series  of  prose  essays  which  has  put  him  in  the  fore- 
front of  English  stylists  and  critics.  But  it  was  only 
in  1848  that  he  scored  his  greatest  triumph  and  won 
universal  applause,  by  his  publication  of  the  first  series 
of  "  The  Biglow  Papers."  That  this  remarkable  pro- 
duction should  have  appeared  in  the  same  year  with  his 
"  Fable  for  Critics  "  and  "  Sir  Launfal,"  is  proof  of 
Lowell's  astonishing  brilliancy  and -versatility. 

The  earlier  poems  merit  consideration,  since  they 
show  signs  of  genuine  human  feeling  and  flashes  of 
poetic  inspiration.  But  in  them  the  poet  is  strug- 
gling with  his  material,  and,  like  Milton's  beasts  at 
the  creation,  is  not  yet  free  from  his  earthly  mold.  In 
"  The  Vision  of  Sir  Launfal  "  he  reaches  his  greatest 


LOWELL'S  GENIUS  ETHICAL  AND  PATRIOTIC    275 

height  in  pure  poetry.  That  poem,  indeed,  has  been 
called  the  finest  idyl  ever  written  by  an  American. 
Lowell's  forte,  however,  was  not  pure  poetry.  It  was 
not  till  he  printed  his  "  Biglow  Papers  "  that  he  re- 
vealed his  true  nature,  and  gave  full  rein  to  his  genius. 
That  genius  was  ethical  and  patriotic.  It  was  states- 
manlike in  its  breadth  and  sanity.  In  his  "  Com- 
memoration Ode "  it  appears  at  its  best.  But  the 
poetry  of  this  "  Ode  "  is  involved  and  obscure ;  and 
that  of  "The  Cathedral"  is  even  more  so.  In  both 
these  poems  there  is  an  air  of  overelaborateness. 
Never  to  the  end  of  his  days  did  Lowell  achieve  real 
simplicity.  Only  in  "  The  Biglow  Papers  "  does  he 
write  with  abandon.  In  them  his  whole  nature  finds 
expression,  as  nowhere  else.  Wit  and  humor  are  his 
true  weapons;  when  he  uses  them,  his  appeal  is  ir- 
resistible. In  "  The  Biglow  Papers  "  he  reached  the 
culmination  of  his  powers,  and  exerted  his  largest  in- 
fluence. But,  before  we  analyze  these  most  character- 
istic of  his  productions,  let  us  glance  at  the  poems 
which  preceded  them,  and  which  represent  Lowell  in 
the  realm  of  pure  poetry. 

Let  us  begin  with  the  poems  suggested  by  domestic 
sorrow.  His  second  daughter,  Rose,  died  after  a 
week's  illness.  "  Dear  little  child'"  lie  writes,  "  she 
had  never  spoken,  only  smiled."  "  After  the  Burial  " 
is  Lowell's  answer  to-  a  letter  of  condolence : 

Immortal?    I  feel  it  and  know  it, 

Who  doubts  it  of  such  as  she? 
But  that  is  the  pang's  very  secret, — 

Immortal  away  from  me. 


2/6  POEMS   OF   DOMESTIC   SORROW 

It  is  pagan;  but  wait  till  you  feel  it, — 
That  jar  of  our  earth,  that  dull  shock 

When  the  ploughshare  of  deeper  passion 
Tears  down  to  our  primitive  rock. 

Communion  in  spirit!     Forgive  me, 

But  I,  who  am  earthly  and  weak, 
Would  give  all  my  incomes  from  dreamland 

For  a  touch  of  her  hand  on  my  cheek. 

That  little  shoe  in  the  corner, 

So  worn  and  wrinkled  and  brown, 

With  its  emptiness  confutes  you, 
And  argues  your  wisdom  down. 

The  frail  health  of  his  wife  makes  her  presence  more 
precious,  and  he  offers  this  tribute  to  her  ennobling 
influence : 

I  cannot  think  that  thou  shouldst  pass  away, 

Whose  life  to  mine  is  an  eternal  law, 

A  piece  of  nature  that  can  have  no  flaw, 

A  new  and  certain  sunrise  every  day; 

But,  if  thou  art  to  be  another  ray 

About  the  Sun  of  Life,  and  art  to  live 

Free  from  what  part  of  thee  was  fugitive, 

The  debt  of  Love  I  will  more  fully  pay, 

Not  downcast  with  the  thought  of  thee  so  high, 

But  rather  raised  to  be  a  nobler  man, 

And  more  divine  in  my  humanity, 

As  knowing  that  the  waiting  eyes  which  scan 

My  life  are  lighted  by  a  purer  being, 

And  ask  high,  calm-browed  deeds,  with  it  agreeing. 


The  "Ode,"  written  in  1841,  reveals  the  ambition 
of  Lowell's  youth.  He  aims  to  be  nothing  less  than 
a  new  voice  of  Almighty  God  to  suffering  and  sorrow- 
ing men : 


GROWTH  OF  LOWELL'S  ETHICAL  PRINCIPLE    277 

In  the  old  days  of  awe  and  keen-eyed  wonder, 
The  Poet's  song  with  blood-warm  truth  was  rife; 

He  saw  the  mysteries  which  circle  under 
The  outward  shell  and  skin  of  daily  life. 


But  now  the  Poet  is  an  empty  rhymer 
Who  lies  with  idle  elbow  on  the  grass, 

And  fits  his  singing,  like  a  cunning  timer, 
To  all  men's  prides  and  fancies  as  they  pass. 

Among  the  toil-worn  poor  my  soul  is  seeking 
For  who  shall  bring  the  Maker's  name  to  light, 

To  be  the  voice  of  that  almighty  speaking 
Which  every  age  demands  to  do  it  right. 

"  The  Parting  of  the  Ways  "  shows  the  growth  of  the 
ethical  principle  in  the  poet's  mind,  and  his  own  de- 
cision to  follow  Duty : 

Who  hath  not  been  a  poet?    Who  hath  not, 
With  life's  new  quiver  full  of  winged  years, 
Shot  at  a  venture,  and  then,  following  on, 
Stood  doubtful  at  the  Parting  of  the  Ways? 

There  once  I  stood  in  dream,  and  as  I  paused, 
Looking  this  way  and  that,  came  forth  to  me 
The  figure  of  a  woman  veiled,  that  said, 
"  My  name  is  Duty,  turn  and  follow  me." 

There  was  a  chill  in  that  voice,  and  for  a  time  the  poet 
was  attracted  by  the  meretricious  form  of  Pleasure, 
who  proposed  Beauty,  instead  of  Duty,  as  his  guide. 
But  Death  laid  hold  of  Beauty,  and  buried  her  under 
a  heap  of  ashes.  Duty  at  last  removed  her  veil,  and 
the  poet  perceived  that  she  alone  was  fair.  It  is  an 
allegory  of  Lowell's  life,  and  it  indicates  his  final 
choice. 


278  "  THE   VISION    OF   SIR   LAUNFAL  " 

Virtue  seems  to  have  been  its  own  reward,  for  this 
choice  was  followed  by  his  greatest  success  in  poetry. 
"  The  Vision  of  Sir  Launfal  "  is  the  first  fruit  of  his 
new  consecration  to  the  cause  of  humanity,  and  it  is 
also  the  most  perfect  of  all  his  poems.  More  of  its 
lines  than  of  any  other  work  of  his  have  become  parts 
of  our  common  speech,  and  are  quoted  by  those  who 
know  nothing  of  their  author.  Indeed,  when  we  have 
once  heard  them,  how  impossible  it  is  to  banish  them 
from  memory !  I  can  mention  only  two  or  three ;  and 
these  I  take  the  liberty  of  putting  together  in  a  new 
order,  so  as  to  connect  what  otherwise  would  be  only 
scattered  fragments: 

What  is  so  rare  as  a  day  in  June? 
Then  Heaven  tries  earth  if  it  be  in  tune, 
No  price  is  set  on  the  lavish  summer; 
June  may  be  had  by  the  poorest  comer. 

At  the  devil's  booth  are  all  things  sold, 
Each  ounce  of  dross  costs  its  ounce  of  gold; 

For  a  cap  and  bells  our  lives  we  pay, 
Bubbles  we  buy  with  a  whole  soul's  tasking: 

'Tis  heaven  alone  that  is  given  away, 
'Tis  only  God  may  be  had  for  the  asking. 

Sir  Launfal  flashed  forth  in  his  maiden  mail, 
To  seek  in  all  climes  for  the  Holy  Grail. 

As  Sir  Launfal  made  morn  through  the  darksome 

gate, 

He  was  'ware  of  a  leper,  crouched  by  the  same, 
Who  begged  with  his  hand  and  moaned  as  he  sate; 
And  seemed  the  one  blot  on  the  summer  morn, — 
So  he  tossed  him  a  piece  of  gold  in  scorn. 
The  leper  raised  not  the  gold  from  the  dust: 
"  Better  to  me  the  poor  man's  crust, 
Better  the  blessing  of  the  poor, 
Though  I  turn  me  empty  from  his  door." 


A    FABLE    FOR    CRITICS  279 

An  old,  bent  man,  worn  out  and  frail, 
He  came  back  from  seeking  the  Holy  Grail; 
But  deep  in  his  soul  the  sign  he  wore, 
The  badge  of  the  suffering  and  the  poor. 

The  leper  once  more  confronts  him,  and  asks  an  alms : 

And  Sir  Launfal  said,  "  I  behold  in  thee 
An  image  of  Him  who  died  on  the  tree; 
Mild  Mary's  Son,  acknowledge  me; 
Behold,  through  him,  I  give  to  thee!  " 

The  leper  no  longer  crouched  at  his  side, 
But  stood  before  him  glorified, 
Himself  the  Gate  whereby  men  can 
Enter  the  temple  of  God  in  Man. 

And  he  hears  the  voice  of  Christ,  saying: 

"  The  Holy  Supper  is  kept,  indeed, 
In  whatso  we  share  with  another's  need; 
Not  what  we  give,  but  what  we  share, 
For  the  gift  without  the  giver  is  bare; 
Who  gives  himself  with  his  alms  feeds  three, 
Himself,  his  hungering  neighbor,  and  me." 

"  A  Fable  for  Critics  "  is  amazingly  sprightly.  It  is 
the  first  gush  of  Lowell's  wit.  Its  novel  rhymes  would 
do  credit  to  Byron.  Yet,  in  spite  of  its  constant 
hilarity,  imagination  and  learning  go  hand  in  hand. 
It  is  a  serious  review  of  American  literature,  and  it 
did  excellent  service  in  correcting  the  faults  of  our 
writing.  We  mistake,  if  we  regard  it  as  mere  satire. 
There  are,  it  is  true,  occasional  touches  of  sarcasm,  as 
in  the  mention  of  Bryant's  chilly  "  iceolation."  But  in 
general  the  tone  is  kindly,  as  became  a  young  man's 
criticism  of  his  elders.  Lowell  makes  Apollo  the  real 


280  "  STANZAS   ON    FREEDOM  " 

speaker,  and  before  him  pass  in  review  all  the  main 
writers  of  the  day : 

"  There  comes  Emerson  first,  whose  rich  words,  every  one, 
Are  like  gold  nails  in  temples  to  hang  trophies  on, 
Whose  prose  is  grand  verse,  while  his  verse,  the  Lord  knows, 
Is  some  of  it  pr No,  'tis  not  even  prose." 

The  comparison  of  Emerson  with  Carlyle  is  both  sane 
and  instructive : 

"  C.  labors  to  get  at  the  centre,  and  then 
Take  a  reckoning  from  there  of  his  actions  and  men; 
E.  calmly  assumes  the  said  centre  as  granted 
And,  given  himself,  has  whatever  is  wanted." 

Alcott,  Brownson,  Willis,  Parker,  Whittier,  Dana, 
Neal,  Hawthorne,  Cooper,  Halleck,  Franco,  Poe,  Mar- 
garet Fuller,  Holmes,  all  pass  under  this  rollicking  and 
spicy  review.  Their  little  peculiarities  and  shortcom- 
ings are  so  gently  and  amusingly  indicated,  that  the 
honor  of  mention  far  outweighs  the  pain  of  criticism, 
and  the  sufferers  must  themselves  acknowledge  that 
"  faithful  are  the  wounds  of  a  friend." 

Lowell's  interest,  however,  was  gradually  turning 
from  literature  to  politics.  In  public  affairs  he  saw 
the  greatest  wrongs  to  be  righted,  and  recognized  his 
most  natural  field  of  action.  His  first  remonstrance 
against  slavery  is  found  in  his  "  Stanzas  on  Freedom  " : 

Men!  whose  boast  it  is  that  ye 
Come  of  fathers  brave  and  free, 
If  there  breathe  on  earth  a  slave, 
Are  ye  truly  free  and  brave? 
If  ye  do  not  feel  the  chain, 


INDIGNATION   AT    POLITICAL    WRONGS  28l 

When  it  works  a  brother's  pain, 
Are  ye  not  base  slaves  indeed, 
Slaves  unworthy  to  be  freed? 

They  are  slaves  who  fear  to  speak 

For  the  fallen  and  the  weak; 

They  are  slaves  who  will  not  choose 

Hatred,  scoffing,  and  abuse, 

Rather  than  in  silence  shrink 

From  the  truth  they  needs  must  think; 

They  are  slaves  who  dare  not  be 

In  the  right  with  two  or  three. 

"  Prometheus  "  is  a  like  appeal  for  justice  to  the  op 
pressed : 

Tyrants  are  but  the  spawn  of  Ignorance, 
Begotten  by  the  slaves  they  trample  on, 
Who,  could  they  win  a  glimmer  of  the  light, 
And  see  that  Tyranny  is  always  weakness, 
Or  Fear  with  its  own  bosom  ill  at  ease, 
Would  laugh  away  in  scorn  the  sand-wove  chain 
Which  their  own  blindness  feigned  for  adamant. 
Wrong  ever  builds  on  quicksands,  but  the  Right 
To  the  firm  centre  lays  its  moveless  base. 

And  his  indignation  culminates  in  "  The  Present 
Crisis,"  in  which  he  urges  the  sons  of  the  Pilgrims  to 
war  against  the  curse  that  then  desolated  our  land : 

Careless  seems  the  great  Avenger;  history's  pages  but  record 
One  death-grapple  in  the  darkness  'twixt  old  systems  and  the 

Word; 

Truth  forever  on  the  scaffold,  Wrong  forever  on  the  throne, — 
Yet  that  scaffold  sways  the  future,  and,  behind  the  dim  un- 
known, 
Standeth  God  within  the  shadow,  keeping  watch  above  his 


282  "  THE    BIGLOW    PAPERS  " 

Then  to  side  with  Truth  is  noble  when  we  share  her  wretched 

crust, 
Ere  her  cause  bring  fame  and  profit,  and  'tis  prosperous  to  be 

just; 
Then  it  is  the  brave  man  chooses,  while  the  coward  stands 

aside, 

Doubting  in  his  abject  spirit,  till  his  Lord  is  crucified, 
And  the  multitude  make  virtue  of  the  faith  they  had  denied. 


For  Humanity  sweeps  onward:  where  to-day  the  martyr 

stands, 

On  the  morrow  crouches  Judas  with  the  silver  in  his  hands, - 
Far  in  front  the  cross  stands  ready  and  the  crackling  fagots 

burn, 

While  the  hooting  mob  of  yesterday  in  silent  awe  return 
To  glean  up  the  scattered  ashes  into  History's  golden  urn. 


New  occasions  teach  new  duties;  Time  makes  ancient  good 
uncouth; 

They  must  upward  still,  and  onward,  who  would  keep  abreast 
of  Truth; 

Lo,  before  us  gleam  her  camp-fires!  we  ourselves  must  Pil- 
grims be, 

Launch  our  Mayflower,  and  steer  boldly  through  the  desperate 
winter  sea, 

Nor  attempt  the  Future's  portal  with  the  Past's  blood-rusted 
key. 

When  Wendell  Phillips  quoted  this  last  stanza  in  his 
Phi  Beta  Kappa  oration  at  Harvard,  it  thrilled  his  au- 
dience, and  it  has  ever  since  been  a  veritable  battle- 
cry  of  freedom. 

All  this  leads  us  up  to  what  we  must  consider  the 
greatest  achievement  of  Lowell's  life — I  mean  the 
publication  of  "  The  Biglow  Papers."  I  call  these  his 
greatest  work,  for  several  reasons:  their  subject  was 
great;  their  occasion  was  great;  and  both  subject  and 


LOWELL    AND    MRS.    STOWE     •  283 

occasion  engaged  his  greatest  powers,  and  all  his 
powers.  Let  us  consider  for  a  moment  the  situation 
of  affairs  a  decade  before  our  great  Civil  War.  Slavery 
had  ceased  to  be  passive  and  remorseful,  and  had  be- 
come aggressive  and  triumphant.  Although  Washing- 
ton, in  his  will,  had  provided  for  the  emancipation  of 
his  own  slaves,  and  Jefferson  had  said,  "  I  tremble  for 
my  country,  when  I  reflect  that  God  is  just,"  the  ac- 
quisition of  Louisiana  had  opened  so  vast  an  area  for 
slave  labor,  and  the  cotton  crop  had  made  that  labor  so 
profitable,  that  slavery  was  now  justified  as  a  divine 
institution,  and  all  opposition  to  its  extension  was 
resented  as  an  invasion  of  the  rights  of  the  South. 
Northern  manufacturers  and  merchants  who  cultivated 
Southern  trade  were  required  to  abstain  from  criticism 
of  the  peculiar  institution.  Even  preachers  in  the 
churches  saw  new  light  with  regard  to  God's  decree  of 
servitude  for  the  black  race,  and  the  old  freedom-loving 
spirit  of  the  North  was  slowly  but  surely  undermined. 
But  there  was  slowly  but  surely  rising  a  moral  indig- 
nation before  which  slavery  was  ultimately  destined  to 
succumb,  and  Mrs.  Stowe's  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  "  and 
Lowell's  "  Biglow  Papers  "  were  both  effects  and  pro- 
moters of  that  indignation. 

Lowell  had  the  advantage  of  Mrs.  Stowe,  not  only 
in  being  the  earlier,  but  also  in  being  the  more  amus- 
ing writer.  Mrs.  Stowe  drew  upon  men's  sympathy; 
Lowell  drew  upon  their  conscience.  Mrs.  Stowe  had 
more  of  humor;  Lowell  had  more  of  wit.  And  wit 
played  a  part  in  this  controversy  that  humor  never 
could.  Wit  gave  a  sword-thrust,  which  showed  that 
the  author  could  fight,  as  well  as  write.  It  was 


284  "THE  BIGLOW  PAPERS  " 

needed  to  convince  the  South  that  the  North  could 
not  always  be  cajoled  or  intimidated.  Southern  lead- 
ers were  sons  of  the  early  Cavaliers  who  settled 
Virginia,  and  whose  conception  of  freedom  was 
feudalistic.  The  king  was  free,  they  thought,  and  his 
lords  were  free,  but  not  the  king's  subjects,  or  the 
lord's  retainers.  In  our  Southern  States,  the  few  slave- 
holders who  managed  the  affairs  of  a  whole  county 
looked  down  upon  the  voters  of  a  Northern  town  meet- 
ing very  much  as  the  Cavaliers  of  old  England  had 
looked  down  upon  the  Roundheads.  Southern  free- 
dom was  theoretical,  but  not  real.  Yet  these  slave- 
holders were  convinced  of  their  own  superiority,  and 
declared  that  one  Southerner  could  whip  five  Yankees. 
Nothing  but  ridicule  could  pierce  their  pachydermatous 
sides.  Lowell  brought  ridicule  to  bear  upon  them ;  but, 
in  this  very  ridicule,  he  showed  the  true  greatness  of 
the  Yankee  stock,  the  thoroughness  of  its  education, 
the  soundness  of  its  morality,  and  the  fighting  force 
of  its  theory  of  government.  In  this  demonstration  of 
Northern  principle  and  efficiency,  the  dialect  poem  was 
a  mere  instrument,  invented  for  a  purpose;  and  that 
purpose,  to  prove  that  the  despised  Yankee,  however 
humble  he  might  be,  towered  far  above  the  defenders 
of  slavery,  in  every  true  attribute  of  manhood.  While 
"  The  Biglow  Papers "  were  Yankee  in  form,  they 
were  universal  in  spirit.  They  were  products  of  the 
American  soil,  and  they  breathed  the  American  inde- 
pendence, while  at  the  same  time  they  were  nobly  and 
profoundly  human.  They  have  no  predecessors  or 
rivals  in  literature,  unless  it  be  in  the  Scottish,  yet 
human,  poems  of  Robert  Burns,  They  ran  like  wild- 


"  THE    BIGLOW    PAPERS  "  285 

fire  through  the  country.  They  were  copied  with  ap- 
plause in  every  newspaper  at  the  North,  and  with  ob- 
jurgation in  every  newspaper  that  dared  print  them  at 
the  South.  Lowell  might  have  published  poems  by  the 
hundred,  of  the  ordinary  sort,  and  might  have  found 
no  great  number  of  readers.  But  when  these  papers 
were  issued  in  1846,  he  woke  one  morning  and  found 
himself  famous.  I  can  quote  only  a  stanza  here  and 
there,  to  show  how  perfectly  they  combine  wit  and 
sense,  ethics  and  amusement.  Let  me  begin  with  the 
utterances  of  Birdofredum  Sawin,  who  represents  the 
claims  of  the  South,  stripped  to  nakedness  and  reduced 
to  language  which  the  humblest  can  understand.  They 
expose  to  everlasting  contempt  the  flamboyant  patriot- 
ism that  can  praise  freedom  in  the  abstract,  while  it 
grinds  the  slave  under  its  heel.  Mr.  Sawin  has  enlisted 
as  a  soldier  in  the  Mexican  war,  and  is  intent  upon 
justifying  that  effort  to  extend  the  bounds  of  slavery: 

Thet  our  nation's  bigger'n  theirn  an'  so  its  rights  air  bigger, 
An'  thet  it's,all  to  make  'em  free  thet  we  air  pullin'  trigger, 
Thet  Anglo  Saxondom's  idee's  abreakin'  'em  to  pieces, 
An'  thet  idee's  thet  every  man  doos  jest  wut  he  damn  pleases; 
Ef  I  don't  make  his  meanin'  clear,  perhaps  in  some  respex  I 

can, 

I  know  thet  "  every  man  "  don't  mean  a  nigger  or  a  Mexican; 
An'  there's  another  thing  I  know,  an'  thet  is,  ef  these  creeturs 
Thet  stick  an  Anglosaxon  mask  onto  Stateprison  feeturs, 
Should  come  to  Jaalam  Centre  fer  to  argify  an'  spout  on't, 
The  gals  'ould  count  the  silver  spoons  the  minnit  they  cleared 

out  on't. 

But  Hosea  Biglow  refuses  to  enlist,  and  scorns  the  en- 
ticements of  the  recruiting  sergeant  in  the  following 
vigorous  language: 


286  "THE    BIGLOW    PAPERS  " 

Thrash  away,  you'll  hev  to  rattle 

On  them  kittle-drums  o'  yourn, — 
'Taint  a  knowin'  kind  o'  cattle 

Thet  is  ketched  with  mouldy  corn; 
Put  in  stiff,  you  fifer  feller, 

Let  folks  see  how  spry  you  be, — 
Guess  you'll  toot  till  you  are  yeller 

'Fore  you'll  git  a  hold  o'  me! 

'Taint  your  eppyletts  an'  feathers 

Make  the  thing  a  grain  more  right; 
'Taint  afollerin'  your  bell-wethers 

Will  excuse  ye  in  His  sight; 
Ef  you  take  a  sword  an'  dror  it, 

And  go  stick  a  feller  thru, 
Guv'ment  aint  to  at  swer  for  it, 

God'll  send  the  bill  to  you. 

Aint  it  cute  to  see  a  Yankee 

Take  sech  everlastin'  pains, 
All  to  get  the  Devil's  thankee 

Helpin"  on  'em  weld  their  chains? 
Wy,  it's  jest  ez  clear  ez  figgers, 

Clear  ez  one  an'  one  make  two, 
Chaps  thet  make  black  slaves  o'  niggers 

Want  to  make  wite  slaves  o'  you. 


"  I'll  return  ye  good  fer  evil 

Much  ez  we  frail  mortils  can, 
But  I  wun't  go  help  the  Devil 

Makin'  man  the  cus  o'  man; 
Call  me  coward,  call  me  traiter, 

Jest  ez  suits  your  mean  idees,— 
Here  I  stand  a  tyrant-hater, 

An'  the  friend  o'  God  an'  Peace!  " 

"  What  Mr.  Robinson  Thinks  "  is  a  telling  satire 
upon  the  slippery  and  mercenary  policy  of  many  North- 
ern statesmen.  It  angered  them,  and  for  many  year? 


"  THE    BIGLOW    PAPERS  "  287 

Lowell  was  shut  out  from  all  places  of  honor  to  which 
they  had  the  key: 

Gineral  C.  is  a  dreffle  smart  man: 

He's  ben  on  all  sides  thet  give  places  or  pelf; 
But  consistency  still  wuz  a  part  of  his  plan, — 
He's  ben  true  to  one  party, — an'  thet  is  himself; — 
So  John  P. 
Robinson  he 
Sez  he  shall  vote  fer  Gineral  C. 


Parson  Wilbur  sez  he  never  heerd  in  his  life 

Thet  th'  Apostles  rigged  out  in  their  swaller-tail  coats, 
An'  marched  round  in  front  of  a  drum  and  a  fife, 
To  git  some  on  'em  office,  an'  some  on  'em  votes; 
But  John  P. 
Robinson  he 
Sez  they  didn't  know  everythin'  down  in  Judee. 

Wai,  it's  a  marcy  we've  gut  folks  to  tell  us 

The  rights  and  the  wrongs  o'  these  matters,  I  vow, — 
God  sends  country  lawyers,  an'  other  wise  fellers, 
To  start  the  world's  team  wen  it  gits  in  a  slough; 
Fer  John  P. 
Robinson  he 
Sez  the  world'll  go  right,  ef  he  hollers  out  Gee! 

And  Increase  D.  O'Phace,  Esquire,  undoubtedly  ut- 
tered the  sentiments  of  many  such,  when  he  averred : 

A  marciful  Providunce  fashioned  us  holler 

O'  purpose  thet  we  might  our  princerples  swaller. 

But  Peace  comes  at  last,  and  Mr.  Hosea  Big-low  salutes 
it,  with  sorrow  for  those  who  have  gone  to  the  war 
never  to  return,  and  yet  with  joy  in  the  great  future 
that  now  opens  before  our  country : 


288  "  THE    BIGLOW    PAPERS  " 

Rat-tat-tat-tattle  thru  the  street 

I  hear  the  drummers  makin'  riot, 
An'  I  set  thinkin'  o'  the  feet 

Thet  follered  once  an'  now  are  quiet, — 
White  feet  ez  snowdrops  innercent, 

Thet  never  knowed  the  paths  o'  Satan, 
Whose  comin'  step  ther'  's  ears  thet  won't, 

No,  not  lifelong,  leave  off  awaitin'. 

Come,  Peace!  not  like  a  mourner  bowed 

For  honor  lost  an'  dear  ones  wasted, 
But  proud,  to  meet  a  people  proud, 

With  eyes  thet  tell  o'  triumph  tasted! 
Come,  with  han'  grippin'  on  the  hilt, 

An'  step  thet  proves  ye  Victory's  daughter! 
Longin'  fer  you,  our  sperits  wilt 

Like  shipwrecked  men's  on  raf's  for  water. 

Come,  while  our  country  feels  the  lift 

Of  a  gret  instinct  shoutin'  "  Forwards!  " 
An'  knows  thet  freedom  ain't  a  gift 

Thet  tarries  long  in  han's  o'  cowards! 
Come,  sech  ez  mothers  prayed  for,  when 

They  kissed  their  cross  with  lips  thet  quivered, 
An'  bring  fair  wages  for  brave  men, 

A  nation  saved,  a  race  delivered! 

His  lines  on  "  International  Copyright "  might  almost 
be  thought  a  summing  up  of  the  whole  doctrine  of 
"  The  Biglow  Papers,"  and  they  well  describe  his  own 
work  and  influence  as  a  poetical  moralist : 

In  vain  we  call  old  notions  fudge, 
And  bend  our  conscience  to  our  dealing; 

The  Ten  Commandments  will  not  budge, 
And  stealing  will  continue  stealing. 

It  would  not  be  fair  to  Lowell,  as  we  take  our  leave 
of  his  work  in  dialect,  if  we  omitted  mention  of  a  little 


"  THE  COURTIN'  "  289 

poem  which  was  originally  composed  merely  to  fill  in  a 
vacant  page  of  "  The  Biglow  Papers."  "  The  Court- 
in'  "  is  a  New  England  idyl,  deserving  of  a  place  side 
by  side  with  "  The  Vision  of  Sir  Launfal,"  though 
written  in  an  entirely  different  vein.  Nothing  can  sur- 
pass the  description  of  the  Yankee  lover's  trembling 
and  embarrassment,  as  he  entered  the  house  of  his 
beloved : 

Zekle  crep'  up  quite  unbeknown 

An'  peeked  in  thru'  the  winder, 
An'  there  sot  Huldy  all  alone, 

'ith  no  one  nigh  to  hender. 

He  kin'  o'  1'itered  on  the  mat, 

Some  doubtfle  o'  the  sekle; 
His  heart  kep'  go  in'  pity -pat, 

But  hern  went  pity  Zekle. 

He  stood  a  spell  on  one  foot  fust, 

Then  stood  a  spell  on  t'other, 
An'  on  which  one  he  felt  the  wust 

He  couldn't  ha'  told  ye  nuther. 

Says  he,  "  I'd  better  call  again;  " 
Says  she,  "  Think  likely,  Mister:  " 

Thet  last  word  pricked  him  like  a  pin, 
An'  .  .  .  Wai,  he  up  an'  kist  her. 


Then  her  red  come  back  like  the  tide 

Down  to  the  Bay  o'  Fundy, 
An'  all  I  know  is  they  was  cried 

In  meetin'  come  nex'  Sunday. 

In  January,  1855,  Lowell  was  appointed  "  Professor 
of  French  and  Spanish  Languages  and  Literatures,  and 
of  Belles  Lettres  "  in  Harvard  College,  thus  succeeding 


2QO  PROSE    WORKS   OF  LOWELL 

Ticknor  and  Longfellow.  He  had  written  much  for 
"  The  North  American  Review,"  and  he  had  given  a 
series  of  Lowell  Lectures.  "  The  Old  Dramatists  " 
had  been  followed  by  prose  essays  on  many  of  the 
great  names  of  literature,  and  he  had  won  the  reputa- 
tion of  our  chief  American  critic.  From  this  time,  in- 
deed, his  main  literary  work  was  in  prose.  While 
its  tone  was  more  and  more  ethical  and  statesmanlike, 
there  was  an  affluence  of  learning  and  a  brilliancy 
of  wit  which  made  all  his  writings  entertaining  and 
memorable.  Its  defect  was  an  overabundance  of  these 
very  qualities.  Wit  is  a  very  good  servant,  but  a  very 
poor  master.  Constant  coruscations  in  the  trolley  car 
show  that  the  electric  current  is  not  under  complete 
control.  Lowell  is  too  much  dominated  by  his  wit  and 
learning.  Some  of  his  articles  remind  one  of  Macau- 
lay's  earliest  essay — the  essay  on  Milton — which  fair- 
ly bristled  with  antithesis  and  eloquence.  The  real 
thought  is  hidden  beneath  the  analogies  that  are  sug- 
gested by  it.  And  yet  Lowell  is  vastly  interesting. 
"  My  Study  Windows  "  look  out  upon  a  wide  pros- 
pect, and  one  cannot  read  these  papers  without  admira- 
tion and  instruction. 

On  two  great  occasions  Lowell  was  chosen  to  de- 
liver poems,  though  his  time  of  youthful  spontaneity 
had  passed.  Harvard  College  sought  to  celebrate  the 
valor  and  devotion  of  her  sons  who  had  fallen  in  de- 
fense of  our  American  Union,  and  no  one  so  fit  as 
Lowell  was  found  to  deliver  the  Commemoration 
Ode.  He  spent  upon  it  the  labor  of  weeks,  as  he 
thought,  in  vain.  At  last  a  mighty  impulse  seized  him, 
and  in  two  days  he  produced  an  elaborate  and  noble 


THE    HARVARD    COMMEMORATION    ODE  2QI 

poem.  Yet  it  lacked  simplicity.  Lowell's  real  vein 
had  been  exhausted.  There  was  no  place  here  for  wit. 
Not  all  his  powers  could  enter  into  the  result  The 
poem  won  applause;  but  the  applause  was  qualified. 
He  was  more  statesman  than  poet,  and  more  moralist 
than  statesman.  Yet  the  opening  lines  were  worthy  of 
the  occasion,  and  worthy  of  him  who  uttered  them : 

Weak-winged  is  song, 
Nor  aims  at  that  clear-ethered  height 
Whither  the  brave  deed  climbs  for  light: 

We  seem  to  do  them  wrong, 
Bringing  our  robin's-leaf  to  deck  their  hearse 
Who  in  warm  life-blood  wrote  their  nobler  verse, 
Our  trivial  song  to  honor  those  who  come 
With  ears  attuned  to  strenuous  trump  and  drum, 
And  shaped  in  squadron-strophes  their  desire, 
Live  battle-odes  whose  lines  were  steel  and  fire: 

Yet  sometimes  feathered  words  are  strong, 
A  gracious  memory  to  buoy  up  and  save 
From  Lethe's  dreamless  ooze,  the  common  grave 

Of  the  unventurous  throng. 

His  description  of  Abraham  Lincoln  may  be  put  side 
by  side  with  Walt  Whitman's  "  My  Captain,"  as  ex- 
pressing the  grief  and  reverence  of  the  North : 

Great  captains,  with  their  guns  and  drums, 
Disturb  our  judgment  for  the  hour, 

But  at  last  silence  comes; 

These  all  are  gone,  and,  standing  like  a  tower, 
Our  children  shall  behold  his  fame. 

The  kindly-earnest,  brave,  foreseeing  man, 
Sagacious,  patient,  dreading  praise,  not  blame, 
New  birth  of  our  new  soil,  the  first  American. 

And  the  closing  lines  of  the  "  Ode  "  attribute  to  God 
the  victory  over  our  great  national  curse : 


292          LOWELL'S  MOST  PRODUCTIVE  YEARS 

Bow  down,  dear  Land,  for  thou  hast  found  release! 
Thy  God,  in  these  distempered  days, 
Hath  taught  thee  the  sure  wisdom  of  His  ways, 

And  through  thine  enemies  hath  wrought  thy  peace! 
Bow  down  in  prayer  and  praise! 

No  poorest  in  thy  borders  but  may  now 

Lift  to  the  juster  skies  a  man's  enfranchised  brow. 

The  second  important  occasion  for  the  recitation  of 
a  poem  was  the  hundredth  anniversary  of  the  fight  at 
Concord  Bridge.  This  too  was  an  improvisation,  writ- 
ten only  two  days  before  the  celebration.  It  ends  with 
a  lofty  appeal  to  the  Spirit  that  nerved  the  men  of 
Seventy-six : 

Freedom,  not  won  by  the  vain, 
Not  to  be  courted  in  play, 
Not  to  be  kept  without  pain. 
Stay  with  us!    Yes,  thou  wilt  stay, 
Handmaid  and  mistress  of  all, 
Kindler  of  deed  and  of  thought, 
.     Thou  that  to  hut  and  to  hall 
Equal  deliverance  brought! 
Souls  of  her  martyrs,  draw  near, 
Touch  our  dull  lips  with  your  fire, 
That  we  may  praise  without  fear 
Her  our  delight,  our  desire, 
Our  faith's  inextinguishable  star, 
Our  hope,  our  remembrance,  our  trust, 
Our  present,  our  past,  our  to  be, 
Who  will  mingle  her  life  with  our  dust 
And  makes  us  deserve  to  be  free! 

The  years  between  1857  and  1877  were  the  most 
productive  of  Lowell's  life.  His  circumstances  were 
favorable.  He  had  contracted  a  second  marriage  with 
Miss  Frances  Dunlap,  of  Portland,  in  Maine.  Elm- 
wood,  near  Cambridge,  was  his  commodious  and  beau- 


LOWELL    AS    EDITOR,    DIPLOMAT,    AND    WIT        293 

tiful  home.  He  was  for  two  years  the  editor  of  "  The 
Atlantic  Monthly,"  and  for  ten  years  afterward  was, 
with  Charles  Eliot  Norton,  the  editor  of  "  The  North 
American  Review."  To  this  Review  he  contributed 
most  of  his  essays.  They  were  political  as  well  as 
literary.  They  attracted  attention  by  their  breadth  of 
historical  outlook,  as  well  as  by  their  soundness  of 
political  judgment.  In  fact,  the  country  had  come  to 
look  upon  him  as  its  chief  representative  in  literature; 
and  when,  in  1877,  President  Hayes  made  him  min- 
ister to  Madrid,  and  when,  in  1880,  he  was  transferred 
to  London,  the  appointments  were  received  with  uni- 
versal applause.  Our  country  was  never  more  nobly 
represented  abroad.  Lowell's  wit  and  learning,  his 
tact  and  sense,  made  him  a  favorite  in  society,  the 
chosen  speaker  at  public  dinners,  and  at  the  same  time 
the  careful  conductor  of  diplomatic  negotiations.  The 
British  universities  paid  him  their  highest  honors.  His 
wife  died  in  1885,  and  he  returned  to  this  country,  to 
spend  his  remaining  years  in  comparative  retirement, 
though  he  was  still  engaged  in  literary  work.  His 
death  occurred  in  1891,  and  his  loss  was  mourned  as 
that  of  our  foremost  man  of  letters. 

Lowell's  wit  was  so  large  a  part  of  his  endow- 
ment, that  specific  mention  needs  to  be  made  of  it. 
Its  spontaneity  was  refreshing.  It  irradiated  his 
speeches,  his  letters,  and  all  his  private  intercourse. 
What  can  be  more  charming  than  the  description  of 
his  trials  in  learning  the  German  language ! 

What  a  language  it  is,  to  be  sure!  with  nominatives  sending 
out  as  many  roots  as  that  witch-grass  which  is  the  pest  of 
all  child-gardens,  and  sentences  in  which  one  sets  sail  like  an 


294  "  THE    CATHEDRAL  " 

admiral  with  sealed  orders,  not  knowing  where  the  devil  he 
is  going  to,  till  he  gets  out  into  mid-ocean!  After  tea,  we 
sit  and  talk  German — or  what  some  of  us  take  to  be  such — 
and  which  I  speak  already  like  a  native — of  some  other  coun- 
try. .  .  The  confounded  genders!  If  I  die,  I  will  have  en- 
graved on  my  tombstone  that  I  died  of  der,  die,  das,  not  be- 
cause I  caught  'em,  but  because  I  couldn't.  .  .  The  next  day 
I  was  up  before  sunrise,  and  got  into  a  habit  of  early  rising 
that  lasted  me  all  that  day.  .  .  I  have  joined  an  Alpine  Club, 
the  members  of  which  ascend  the  highest  peaks  by  proxy, 
using  an  achromatic  telescope  to  see  others  do  it. 

When  Lord  John  Russell,  with  some  fear  that  he  might 
decline,  invited  him  as  "  the  most  engaged  man  in 
London,"  he  accepted  the  invitation  as  coming  from 
"  the  most  engaging  man  in  London."  Nothing  could 
surpass  his  poise  and  mastery  of  a  social  occasion,  so 
that  his  friends,  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  were 
numberless.  And  yet  his  nature,  lavish  as  it  was,  had 
depth  as  well  as  richness.  At  bottom  there  was  a  seri- 
ous view  of  life,  which  qualified  him  to  be  one  of  the 
moralists  of  his  generation.  It  was  this  gift  which 
was  most  conspicuous  in  his  address  on  "  Democracy  " 
at  Birmingham,  in  England,  and  in  his  address  in  com- 
memoration of  the  two-hundred-and-fiftieth  anniver- 
sary of  the  founding  of  Harvard  University. 

"  The  Cathedral,"  originally  called  "  A  Day  at  Char- 
tres,"  is  Lowell's  last  notable  contribution  to  poetry. 
It  is  full  of  thought  and  feeling,  but  the  verse  is  in- 
tricate, and  the  meaning  sometimes  as  obscure  as 
Browning's  "  Sordello."  The  poet  sees  in  the  century- 
growth  of  the  cathedral  the  type  of  all  historic  prog- 
ress. That  progress  is  rooted  in  the  faith  of  the  past : 
it  witnesses  to  the  need  of  such  faith  in  these  times 
which  boast  advance  but  may  mistake  the  key : 


LOWELL  S   CONFESSION   OF   FAITH 

I  stood  before  the  triple  northern  port, 
Where  dedicated  shapes  of  saints  and  kings, 
Stern  faces  bleared  with  immemorial  watch, 
Looked  down  benignly  grave  and  seemed  to  say, 
Ye  come  and  go  incessant;  we  remain 
Safe  in  the  hallowed  quiets  of  the  past; 
Be  reverent,  ye  who  flit  and  are  forgot, 
Of  faith  so  nobly  realized  as  this. 


And  its  later  lines  recognize  the  indwelling  God  as  the 
source  of  such  faith,  imparting  it  to  every  child,  and 
helping  every  man  in  its  expression : 

O  Power,  more  near  my  life  than  life  itself 
(Or  what  seems  life  to  us  in  sense  immured), 
Even  as  the  roots,  shut  in  the  darksome  earth, 
Share  in  the  tree-top's  joyance,  and  conceive 
Of  sunshine  and  wide  air  and  winged  things 
By  sympathy  of  nature,  so  do  I 
Have  evidence  of  Thee  so  far  above, 
Yet  in  and  of  me!    Rather  Thou  the  root 
Invisibly  sustaining,  hid  in  light, 
Not  darkness,  or  in  darkness  made  by  us. 

This  poem  forms  the  natural  transition  to  a  con- 
sideration of  Lowell's  theology.  It  was  printed  in 
1869,  before  his  public  life  began.  He  himself  called 
it  "  a  kind  of  religious  poem."  It  is  indeed  a  confes- 
sion of  faith,  noble  in  many  respects,  yet  lacking 
some  of  the  best  elements  of  Christian  belief.  "  The 
Cathedral  "  will  furnish  us  with  material  both  for 
praise  and  for  criticism.  We  may  begin  by  pointing 
out  that  Lowell,  while  recognizing  an  immanent  God, 
has  no  faith  in  a  God  who  is  transcendent,  and  there- 
fore can  believe  in  no  miracle  or  special  revelation. 
The  closing  lines  of  the  poem  make  this  plain : 


296       LOWELL'S  ERROR  AS  TO  GOD 

If  sometimes  I  must  hear  good  men  debate 

Of  other  witness  of  Thyself  than  Thou, 

As  if  there  needed  any  help  of  ours 

To  nurse  Thy  flickering  life,  that  else  must  cease, 

Blown  out,  as  't  were  a  candle,  by  men's  breath, 

My  soul  shall  not  be  taken  in  their  snare, 

To  change  her  inward  surety  for  their  doubt 

Muffled  from  sight  in  formal  robes  of  proof: 

While  she  can  only  feel  herself  through  Thee, 

I  fear  not  Thy  withdrawal;  more  I  fear, 

Seeing,  to  know  Thee  not,  hoodwinked  with  dreams 

Of  signs  and  wonders,  while,  unnoticed,  Thou, 

Walking  Thy  garden  still,  commun'st  with  men, 

Missed  in  the  commonplace  of  miracle. 


Truth  and  error  are  so  interwoven  here  that  some  in- 
sight is  needed  to  disentangle  them.  The  great  truth 
that  God  is  in  all,  and  through  all,  is  made  to  imply 
that  this  is  his  only  being,  and  his  only  method  of 
manifestation,  and  so  to  involve  what  Scripture  would 
call  a  limitation  of  the  Holy  One  of  Israel.  The 
apostle  Paul  avoids  this  error,  when  he  declares  that 
God  is  not  only  "  in  all,"  and  "  through  all,"  but  also 
"  above  all."  "  But  a  whisper  is  heard  of  Him,"  says 
the  book  of  Job ;  "  the  thunder  of  his  power  who  can 
understand !  "  To  limit  God  to  mere  Nature  is  vir- 
tually to  deny  his  omnipotence,  and  even  his  person- 
ality. But  if  God  is  above  Nature,  and  not  simply  one 
with  Nature,  he  can  act  upon  Nature  and  apart  from 
Nature,  whenever  there  is  need ;  and  miracle  and  spe- 
cial revelation  are  possible. 

The  real  question,  then,  is  the  question  of  need.  Is 
there  a  moral  need,  which  it  is  becoming  that  God 
should  supply?  Is  the  enlightenment,  which  the  uni- 
versal presence  of  God  in  nature  gives,  a  sufficient  en- 


LOWELL   IGNORES    SIN  2Q7 

lightenment  in  man's  actual  moral  condition?  The 
answer  to  this  question  is  given  to  us  in  John's  Gospel, 
When  the  apostle  asserts  that  before  Christ  came  in  the 
flesh  "  the  light  shone  in  the  darkness,  and  the  dark- 
ness apprehended  it  not."  In  other  words,  man's  sin 
prevented  God's  light  from  having  its  normal  and 
proper  effect.  Lowell's  error  with  regard  to  miracle 
and  revelation,  then,  is  an  error  with  regard  to  man's 
moral  condition.  He  ignores  man's,  sin  and  perversity, 
which  "  hinder  the  truth  in  unrighteousness,"  and 
which  necessitate  special  revelation  to  awaken  con- 
science and  to  draw  forth  repentant  love.  Such  a  reve- 
lation must  make  plain  God's  personality,  his  holiness, 
his  self-sacrificing  desire  to  save;  and  such  a  revelation 
is  actually  given  us  in  Christ's  atoning  death  and  in  his 
offer  to  deliver  the  sinner  from  the  bondage  of  his 
sins.  But  Lowell  seems  to  have  no  personal  experience 
of  his  need  as  a  sinner.  He  has  no  proper  conception 
of  God  as  the  hater  and  punisher  of  sin,  nor  of  Christ 
as  the  divine  Saviour  from  its  guilt  and  defilement 
He  rather  prefers  the  pagan  way  of  salvation,  and 
trusts  that  man, 

unconscious  heir 

To  the  influence  sweet  of  Athens  and  of  Rome, 
And  old  Judaea's  gift  of  secret  fire, 
Spite  of  himself  shall  surely  learn  to  know 
And  worship  some  ideal  of  himself, 
Some  divine  thing,  large-hearted,  brotherly, 
Not  nice  in  trifles,  a  soft  creditor, 
Pleased  with  his  world,  and  hating  only  cant. 

In  other  words,  Lowell's  God  will  be  a  God  of  infinite 
good  nature,  who  makes  no  moral  distinctions.     Such 
a  God  will  be  no  terror  to  the  ungodly,  and  no  Mediator 
v 


298      LOWELL    MAKES   THE    CROSS   AN    EXAMPLE 

will  be  needed  to  make  propitiation  for  men's  sins. 
Christ  is  not  "  the  fulness  of  the  Godhead  bodily,"  but 
only  one  of  many  guides  and  saviors,  whose  life  and 
example  have  made  the  path  of  duty  easier  for  our 
feet;  and  his  Cross  becomes  only  a  model  of  patience 
in  suffering  the  ills  that  afflict  us  all : 

Whatsoe'er 

The  form  of  building  or  the  creed  professed, 
The  Cross,  bold  type  of  shame  to  homage  turned, 
Of  an  unfinished  life  that  sways  the  world, 
Shall  tower  as  sovereign  emblem  over  all. 

With  no  inner  experience  of  the  grace  of  God  in 
Jesus  Christ,  it  is  no  wonder  that  the  beliefs  of  the 
fathers  should  seem  only  the  useful  incidents  of  an 
historic  past,  and  quite  inapplicable  to  the  improved 
conditions  of  the  present  day: 

'Tis  irrecoverable,  that  ancient  faith, 
Homely  and  wholesome,  suited  to  the  time, 
With  rod  or  candy  for  child-minded  men. 

Nothing  that  keeps  thought  out  is  safe  from  thought. 
And  Truth  defensive  hath  lost  hold  on  God. 

Each  age  must  worship  its  own  thought  of  God, 
More  or  less  earthy,  clarifying  still 
With  subsidence  continuous  of  the  dregs. 

But  each  man  has  within  him  the  infinite  Source,  from 
whom  have  proceeded  all  the  revelations  of  the  past, 
and  who  is  ready  to  give  to  us  new  evidences  of  his 
presence : 


LOWELLS    VIEW    OF    PRAYER  2Q9 

This  life  were  brutish  did  we  not  sometimes 
Have  intimations  clear  of  wider  scope, 
Hints  of  occasion  infinite,  to  keep 
The  soul  alert  with  noble  discontent 
And  onward  yearnings  of  unstilled  desire; 
Fruitless,  except  we  now  and  then  divined 
A  mystery  of  Purpose,  gleaming  through 
The  secular  confusions  of  the  world, 
Whose  will  we  darkly  accomplish,  doing  ours. 

And  he  does  not  deem  himself  recreant  to  his  fathers' 
faith,  although 

Its  forms  to  me  are  weariness,  and  most 

That  drony  vacuum  of  compulsory  prayer, 

Still  pumping  phrases  for  the  Ineffable, 

Though  all  the  valves  of  memory  gasp  and  wheeze. 

I,  that  still  pray  at  morning  and  at  eve, 
Loving  those  roots  that  feed  us  from  the  past, 
And  prizing  more  than  Plato  things  I  learned 
At  that  best  academe,  a  mother's  knee, 
Thrice  in  my  life  perhaps  have  truly  prayed, 
Thrice,  stirred  below  my  conscious  self,  have  felt 
That  perfect  disenthralment  which  is  God. 

But  never  has  he  prayed  in  sole  dependence  upon 
Christ,  or  other  than  as  one  who  comes  directly  into 
the  presence  and  favor  of  his  Father.  "  Every  man's 
his  own  Melchisedek  " — his  own  priest  and  his  own 
savior : 

I  think  man's  soul  dwells  nearer  to  the  east, 
Nearer  to  morning's  fountains  than  the  sun; 
Herself  the  source  whence  all  tradition  sprang, 
Herself  at  once  both  labyrinth  and  clue. 
The  miracle  fades  out  of  history, 
But  faith  and  wonder  and  the  primal  earth 
Are  born  into  the  world  with  every  child. 


3OO        LOWELL   IN    CONTRAST    WITH    BROWNING 

This  may  be  theism,  but  it  is  not  Christianity.  The 
vagueness  of  its  conception  of  God,  its  ignorance  of 
God's  holiness  and  of  man's  sin,  the  absence  of  faith  in 
God's  appointed  way  of  salvation  through  Christ,  show 
it  to  be  a  man-made  scheme,  incapable  of  giving  relief 
to  a  burdened  conscience,  or  of  comforting  a  weak  and 
afflicted  soul.  Man  needs  to  see  his  own  nature  in  God, 
or  rather,  needs  to  see  God  in  human  form.  Hero- 
worship,  emperor-worship,  Mithras-worship,  are  all 
of  them  efforts  of  mankind  to  find  a  human  heart  in 
the  Godhead.  This  universal  instinct  is  satisfied  only 
by  Christianity,  which  shows  us  the  eternal  Word 
made  flesh,  yet  exalted  to  be  King  of  kings  and  Lord 
of  lords.  With  James  Russell  Lowell's  "  Cathedral  " 
I  would  contrast  Robert  Browning's  "  Saul  " ;  and 
would  maintain  that  this  latter  poem  furnishes  a  far 
better' basis  for  communion  with  a  personal  God,  for 
comfort  amid  the'  struggles  of  our  earthly  life,  and  for 
courage  in  the  performance  of  social  and  civic  duty, 
than  does  the  poem  we  have  been  considering.  Listen 
to  David's  heartening  appeal  to  Saul : 

"Tis  the  weakness  in  strength,  that  I  cry  for!  my  flesh,  that  I 

seek 

In  the  Godhead!    I  seek  and  I  find  it.    O  Saul,  it  shall  be 
A  Face  like  my  face  that  receives  thee;  a  Man  like  to  me, 
Thou  shalt  love  and  be  loved  by,  forever:  a  Hand  like  this 

hand 
Shall  throw  open  the  gates  of  new  life  to  thee!     See  the 

Christ  stand!  " 

What  help  did  Lowell's  religion  give  him  in  time  of 
bereavement,  and  when  he  drew  near  to  the  gates  of 
death  ?  We  have  already  seen  that  after  the  loss  of  his 


LOWELL   ON    IMMORTALITY  3OI 

child  he  confessed  himself  a  pagan.  He  derived  no 
comfort  from  the  thought  of  a  present  Christ,  into 
whose  loving  arms  he  could  commit  his  loved  one,  with 
the  assurance  that  she  should  be  restored  to  him,  when 
life's  short  day  was  past,  but  cleansed  from  the  dis- 
honors of  the  tomb  and  clad  with  immortality.  When 
his  wife  dies,  he  can  only  write : 

I  can  only  hope  and  pray  that  the  sweet  influences  of  thir- 
teen years  spent  with  one  like  her  may  be  seen  and  felt  in 
my  daily  life  henceforth.  At  present  I  only  feel  that  there  is 
a  chamber  whose  name  is  Peace,  and  which  opens  towards  the 
sun-rising,  and  that  I  am  not  in  it. 

He  seems  to  have  no  definite  expectation  of  seeing  her 
again.  His  poem,  "  She  Came  and  Went,"  expresses 
thankfulness  for  the  past,  but  no  joy  in  the  present,  and 
no  hope  for  the  future : 

An  angel  stood  and  met  my  gaze, 

Through  the  low  doorway  of  my  tent; 

The  tent  is  struck,  the  vision  stays; — 
I  only  know  she  came  and  went. 

Oh,  when  the  room  grows  slowly  dim, 

And  life's  last  oil  is  nearly  spent, 
One  gush  of  light  these  eyes  will  brim, 

Only  to  think  she  came  and  went. 

Christ  has  brought  life  and  immortality  to  light  in 
his  glorious  gospel.  When  Jonathan  Edwards  died, 
his  wife,  that  saintly  woman,  was  so  filled  with  the 
joy  of  her  Lord,  that  she  had  to  hide  herself  from 
visitors,  lest  they  should  fancy  that  her  submission  to 
God's  will,  and  her  certainty  of  future  reunion,  indi- 
cated gladness  at  her  husband's  death.  Thousands  of 


3O2        "  EPISTLE   TO    GEORGE    WILLIAM    CURTIS  " 

Christians  have  rejoiced  that  not  only  life,  but  also 
death,  was  theirs,  and  have  been  able  to  sing : 

"  Do  we  count  the  star  lost  that  is  hidden 

In  the  great  light  of  morn? 
Or  fashion  a  shroud  for  the  young  child 
In  the  day  it  is  born? 

"Yet  behold!  that  were  wise,  to  their  sorrow 

Who  mourn,  sore  distressed, 
When  a  soul,  that  is  summoned  believing, 
Enters  into  its  rest." 

But  the  best  utterance  of  Lowell's  hope  for  the  future 
is  found  in  his  "  Epistle  to  George  William  Curtis." 
An  indefinite  "  Otherwhere  "  is  his  conception  of  the 
future  life,  and  it  has  in  it  no  connection  with  Christ, 
and  no  hint  that  there  is  "none  other  name  under 
heaven  among  men,  wherein  we  must  be  saved  " : 

I  muse  upon  the  margin  of  the  sea, 

Our  common  pathway  to  the  new  To  Be, 

Watching  the  sails,  that  lessen  more  and  more, 

Of  good  and  beautiful  embarked  before; 

With  bits  of  wreck  I  patch  the  boat  shall  bear 

Me  to  that  unexhausted  Otherwhere, 

Whose  friendly-peopled  shore  I  sometimes  see, 

By  soft  mirage  uplifted,  beckon  me, 

Nor  sadly  hear,  as  lower  sinks  the  sun, 

My  moorings  to  the  past  snap  one  by  one. 

Lowell  was  a  moralist,  and  not  a  theologian ;  a  theist, 
and  not  a  Christian.  It  is  an  interesting  question  how 
far  his  conceptions  of  God  affected  his  ideas  of  duty. 
What  is  the  normal  relation  of  morality  to  religion? 
I  reply  that  religion  is  morality  toward  God,  as  moral- 
ity is  religion  toward  men.  The  two  are  meant  to  be 


MORALITY   AND    RELIGION  303 

obverse  sides  of  one  and  the  same  great  fact  of  life. 
But  human  perversity  has  separated  them;  the  one 
seems  at  times  to  exist  without  the  other;  we  see  re- 
ligion without  morality,  and  morality  without  religion. 
When  thus  separated,  neither  one  is  of  real  or  per- 
manent value.  Religion  without  morality  is  a  tree 
without  fruits ;  morality  without  religion  is  a  tree  with- 
out roots.  Human  progress  consists  in  the  ever- 
increasing  union  of  the  two ;  human  perfection  will  be 
attained  only  when  love  to  God  is  the  source  of  love 
to  man,  and  love  to  man  is  the  constant  result  and 
proof  of  love  to  God. 

The  moralist  builds  securely,  only  when  the  founda- 
tion of  his  system  is  laid  upon  the  Rock  of  Ages.  In 
just  the  proportion  that  he  constructs  his  edifice  with- 
out this  foundation,  he  builds  upon  the  sand,  and  time 
undoes  his  work.  Or,  to  change  the  simile,  ethics 
without  God,  by  which  I  mean  ethics  which  ignores  the 
Christian  revelation,  is  an  orchid-growth,  that  lives- on 
air;  while  Christian  ethics  is  like  the  rose,  which  has 
deep  root  in  virgin  soil.  The  orchid  has  its  beauty; 
but  that  beauty  fades,  and  the  light  wind  of  passion 
sweeps  it  away;  while  the  rose  has  a  permanent  love- 
liness, and  a  fragrance  which  the  orchid  never  pos- 
sesses. To  apply  my  illustrations  to  the  present  case, 
I  would  say  that  Lowell,  with  all  his  moral  earnestness, 
has  missed  the  true  theory  of  morals,  and  so  has  given 
us  only  detached  maxims,  truths  which  are  the  proper 
fruit  of  Christianity  alone,  and  which,  without  con- 
nection with  their  source,  lack  both  motive  and  life. 

The  ethics  of  the  mere  moralist  are  like  the  fruits 
seen  on  the  Christmas  tree.  Apples  and  oranges,  pears 


304     LOWELL'S  VIRTUES  FRUITS  OF  CALVINISM 

and  lemons,  bananas  and  peaches  are  there.  But  they 
never  grew  there;  they  are  only  tacked  on;  when 
they  disappear,  no  others  will  ever  take  their  places. 
Lowell's  social  and  civic  virtues  never  grew  upon  the 
theologic  stock  which  he  cultivated.  They  were  grown 
upon  the  old  Calvinistic  tree.  When  New  England 
broke  away  from  evangelical  doctrine  and  swung  off 
into  Unitarianism,  many  of  the  fruits  of  the  old  re- 
ligion still  survived,  and  our  poet  made  good  use  of 
them.  It  was  not  his  theology  that  conquered  in  our 
Civil  War;  it  was  the  old  faith  in  a  personal  God,  and 
in  his  ordinance  of  civil  government,  that  nerved  the 
hearts  of  our  people.  It  was  Bible  preaching,  and  not 
moralistic  poetry,  that  carried  our  country  through 
the  struggle  for  freedom  of  the  slave  and  union  of  the 
States.  And  when  faith  in  the  Scriptures,  and  in 
Christ  as  our  divine  Lord  and  Redeemer,  dies  out  of 
American  hearts,  no  poetry  of  Lowell's  will  save  us 
from  national  collapse  and  ruin. 

I  say  these  things  with  all  proper  admiration  for 
Lowell's  gifts  and  services.  But  let  the  moralist 
know  his  place.  He  is  second,  not  first ;  the  echoer  of 
a  tradition,  not  an  original  authority;  and  whatever 
of  good  is  in  him  is  due  to  the  modicum  of  religious 
faith,  which,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  expresses 
itself  in  his  ethics.  Something  of  that  early  faith  still 
lingers  in  the  verse  of  our  poet;  though  lack  of  faith 
causes  much  of  his  work  to  come  short  of  its  proper 
depth  and  value.  In  what  follows  of  this  essay,  I  de- 
sire to  point  out  the  merit,  and  yet  the  demerit,  of  cer- 
tain of  Lowell's  poems,  resulting  from  the  mixture 
of  truth  and  errox  in  his  theology. 


LOWELL    DENIES    SPECIAL    INSPIRATION  305 

Take  the  matter  of  inspiration.  In  his  early  days, 
the  poet  had  no  faith  in  any  impact  of  a  superior 
Power  upon  .the  minds  of  men.  All  knowledge  must 
come  from  within.  In  1839  he  wrote: 

I  have  wondered  whether  you  believed  in  the  divine  inspi- 
ration of  the  Hebrew  prophets.  Do  you?  I  don't.  I  once 
thought  it  an  argument  in  their  favor  that,  in  all  the  world, 
there  has  not,  before  or  since,  been  any  writing  that  com- 
pared with  theirs  in  poetic  sublimity.  Now  that  I  am  older, 
this  very  thing  seems  to  me  against  them.  I  think  that  if  you 
compare  it  with  that  of  our  Saviour  (whose  inspiration  I 
would  be  more  willing  to  admit),  you  will  perceive  my  mean- 
ing. His,  you  will  notice,  is  prose;  theirs  poetic  sublimity— 
and  herein  lies  the  difference  between  inspiration,  or  percep- 
tion of  real  truth,  and  enthusiasm,  or  longing  after  ideal  truth. 

Yet,  not  long  after,  he  himself  had  a  revelation,  and 
got  a  clue  to  a  whole  system  of  spiritual  philosophy : 

The  whole  system  rose  up  before  me  like  a  vague  Destiny 
looming  from  the  abyss.  I  never  before  so  clearly  felt  the 
spirit  of  God  in  me  and  around  me.  The  whole  room  seemed 
to  me  full  of  God.  The  air  seemed  to  waver  to  and  fro 
with  the  presence  of  Something,  I  knew  not  what.  I  spoke 
with  the  calmness  and  clearness  of  a  prophet. 

As  is  often  the  case,  from  one  extreme  he  went  to 
another;  from  denial  of  all  inspiration,  he  came  to 
believe  in  the  inspiration  of  all  men,  at  least  in  favored 
moments  of  their  existence.  In  "  The  Cathedral," 
Lowell  declares  his  confidence  that  God  manifests  him- 
self to  all : 

Man  cannot  be  God's  outlaw  if  he  would, 
Nor  so  abscond  him  in  the  caves  of  sense 
But  Nature  still  shall  search  some  crevice  out 
With  messages  of  splendor  from  that  Source 
Which,  dive  he,  soar  he,  baffles  still  and  lures. 


306          LOWELL  IDENTIFIES   GOD    WITH    NATURE 

In  that  noble  poem,  "  A  Winter-Evening  Hymn  to  my 
Fire,"  he  shows  how  God's  gifts  in  the  past  may  be 
utilized  in  the  present,  and  may  be  made  our  own. 
Addressing  his  Fire,  as  if  it  were  a  living  person,  he 
tells  of  the  wisdom  which  men  divinely  stirred  have 
given  to  us : 

Therefore  with  thee  I  love  to  read 

Our  brave  old  poets:  at  thy  touch  how  stirs 

Life  in  the  withered  words!  how  swift  recede 

Time's  shadows!  and  how  glows  again 

Through  its  dead  mass  the  incandescent  verse, 

As  when  upon  the  anvils  of  the  brain 

It  glittering  lay,  cyclopically  wrought 

By  the  fast-throbbing  hammers  of  the  poet's  thought! 

How  plain  it  is  that  Lowell's  objection  to  inspiration 
is  due  to  his  identification  of  God  with  Nature!  If 
God  is  only  another  name  for  Nature,  he  is  immanent, 
but  not  transcendent,  and  he  can  manifest  himself  only 
within  us,  and  in  the  way  of  natural  cause  and  effect. 
We  can  deny  the  special  inspiration  of  any,  or  we  can 
affirm  the  inspiration  of  all.  But  if  God  is  not -con- 
fined to  Nature,  he  can  produce  effects  for  which 
Nature  is  herself  incompetent.  Nature  is  not  God,  but 
only  the  partial  expression  of  God.  God  is  not  con- 
fined to  Nature ;  he  can  "  cut  short  his  work  in  right- 
eousness " ;  with  him  "  one  day  is  as  a  thousand  years." 
Lowell  is  right  in  affirming  that  God  manifests  him- 
self inwardly;  for  there  is  a  "  Light  that  lighteth  every 
man,"  and  even  conscience  is  an  echo  of  his  voice.  But 
Lowell  is  wrong  when  he  affirms  that  this  is  the  only 
method  of  divine  revelation.  In  every  man  there  is  a 
capacity  for  greater  insight  than  he  now  possesses; 


LOWELL    FATALLY    INDIFFERENT   TO    SIN          307 

we  all  have  occasional  flashes  of  genius;  telepathy  and 
premonition  show  that  there  are  hidden  powers  which 
are  now  unused.  Inspiration  is  only  the  intensification 
of  natural  faculties,  under  the  special  influence  of  the 
divine  Spirit;  even  prophetic  inspiration  is  only  the 
lifting  of  man  up  to  heights  of  prescience  and  prediction 
which  belong  to  him  by  nature,  but  which  he  has  lost 
by  his  sin.  Inspiration  then  is  both  natural  and  super- 
natural. The  universal  presence  of  God  in  humanity 
does  not  prevent,  but  rather  makes  possible,  a  special 
influence  of  God's  enlightening  Spirit  in  times  of  need. 
Again  the  question  presents  itself:  Is  there  need?  It 
is  Lowell's  insufficient  understanding  of  man's  blind- 
ness and  sin  that  prevents  him  from  seeing  the  pos- 
sibility and  the  reality  of  special  divine  revelation. 
And  what  is  true  of  inspiration  is  also  true  of  miracle. 
The  God  of  Nature  can  work  apart  from  Nature,  and 
can  condense  into  a  single  act  of  incarnation  or  of 
atonement  the  whole  meaning  of  the  universe  and  the 
whole  manifestation  of  his  mind  and  heart  and  will. 

Emerson  has  very  properly  been  criticized  for  his 
"  fatal  indifference  to  moral  considerations."  It  may 
seem  harsh  to  accuse  Lowell,  our  moralistic  poet,  of 
similar  error.  But  his  ignorance  of  sin  and  his  mis- 
understanding of  the  character  of  God  have  sad  effects 
in  practical  morals  as  well  as  in  abstract  theology.  The 
moralist  should,  above  all  else,  believe  in  the  supremacy 
of  the  Right.  Fiat  justitla,  ruat  coelum,  should  be  his 
motto.  The  demand  of  conscience  that  penalty  should 
follow  wrong-doing  should  never  be  ignored  or  ex- 
plained away.  Love  should  always  ,be  the  servant  of 
righteousness,  and  never  its  servant  or  master.  God 


3O&        LOWELL  AND   WORDSWORTH    CONTRASTED 

has  made  death  to  be  the  sign  of  his  estimate  of  sin. 
Physical  death,  or  the  separation  of  the  soul  from  the 
body,  is  the  outward  symbol  of  spiritual  death,  or  the 
separation  of  the  soul  from  God.  To  abolish  the 
penalty  of  death,  in  the  case  of  the  murderer,  is  to 
break  down  God's  instruction  of  the  race  both  in  nature 
and  in  Scripture,  to  weaken  the  sense  of  mutual  ob- 
ligation, and  to  give  free  rein  to  human  passion  and 
hatred.  Yet  this  is  what  Lowell  does,  when  he  con- 
demns the  poet  Wordsworth  for  his  defense  of  capital 
punishment  I  need  only  quote  a  sonnet  from  each  of 
these,  to  show  how  superior  in  moral  earnestness  is  the 
poem  of  Wordsworth.  Let  me,  however,  begin  with 
Lowell: 

The  love  of  all  things  springs  from  love  of  one; 

Wider  the  soul's  horizon  hourly  grows, 

And  over  it  with  fuller  glory  flows 

The  sky-like  spirit  of  God;  a  hope -begun 

In  doubt  and  darkness  "neath  a  fairer  sun 

Cometh  to  fruitage,  if  it  be  of  Truth; 

And  to  the  law  of  meekness,  faith,  and  ruth, 

By  inward  sympathy,  shall  all  be  won: 

This  thou  shouldst  know,  who,  from  the  painted 

feature 

Of  shifting  Fashion,  couldst  thy  brethren  turn 
Unto  the  love  of  ever-youthful  Nature, 
And  of  a  beauty  fadeless  and  eterne; 
And  always  't  is  the  saddest  sight  to  see 
An  old  man  faithless  in  Humanity. 

The  "  old  man  "  was  wiser  than  his  youthful  critic. 
He  believed  in  Deity  even  more  than  he  believed  in 
humanity.  And  so  Wordsworth  has  condensed  into 
a  single  one  of  his  "  Sonnets  upon  the  Punishment  of 
Death"  more  of  truth  than  can  be  found  in  all  of 
Lowell's  poetry : 


THE    CROSS    IN    LOWELL'S    THEOLOGY  309 

"  Is  Death,  when  evil  against  good  has  fought 
With  such  fell  mastery  that  a  man  may  dare 
By  deeds  the  blackest  purpose  to  lay  bare? 
Is  Death,  for  one  to  that  condition  brought 
For  him  or  any  one,  the  thing  that  ought 
To  be  most  dreaded?    Lawgivers,  beware, 
Lest,  capital  pains  remitting  till  ye  spare 
The  murderer,  ye,  by  sanction  to  that  thought 
Seemingly  given",  debase  the  general  mind; 
Tempt  the  vague  will  tried  standards  to  disown, 
Nor  only  palpable  restraints  unbind, 
But  upon  Honour's  head  disturb  the  crown, 
Whose  absolute  rule  permits  not  to  withstand 
In  the  weak  love  of  life  his  least  command." 


Lowell's  theology  appears  most  defective  when  he 
alludes  to  the  doctrine  of  the  atonement  He  cannot 
understand  that  doctrine,  because  he  has  no  proper 
faith  in  the  holiness  of  God,  or  in  trie  necessity  of  God's 
nature  which  makes  suffering  to  follow  sin.  A  holy 
God,  who,  for  the  sake  of  creaturely  freedom  and 
virtue,  permits  the  existence  of  sin,  must  not  only 
visit  that  sin  with  penalty,  but  must  himself  suffer 
with  and  for  the  sinner.  Only  love  leads  the  divine 
Being  to  undertake  this  suffering;  only  holiness  makes 
that  suffering  necessary.  The  Cross  of  Christ  is  the 
exhibition  in  space  and  time  of  this  eternal  suffering 
of  the  divine  nature.  The  atonement  is  a  substitution 
of  God's  suffering  for  ours,  only  as  it  is  a  sharing  of 
our  guilt  and  penalty  by  One  who  is  the  very  life  of 
humanity.  Lowell's  wit  was  never  so  misapplied  as 
when,  in  "A  Fable  for  Critics,"  he  put  in  the  pil- 
lory of  his  derision  what  he  conceived  to  be  the  doc- 
trine of  the  atonement  as  preached  by  an  orthodox 
divine. 


3IO  A    MISPLACING   OF   LOWELLS    WIT 

[Doctor]  Cheever  has  proved  that  the  Bible  and  Altar 
Were  let  down  from  Heaven  at  the  end  of  a  halter; 
And  that  vital  religion  would  dull  and  grow  callous, 
Unrefreshed,  now  and  then,  with  a  sniff  of  the  gallows. 

Yes,  the  Cross  was  the  Roman  gallows !  It  was  the 
deepest  ignominy  that  man  could  suffer;  and,  because 
it  was  the  very  acme  of  earthly  penalty,  divine  holiness 
bore  it  in  our  nature  and  in  our  stead,  that  we  might 
go  free.  That  Cross  has  moved  human  hearts  to  peni- 
tence, as  no  maxims  of  the  sages  ever  could.  It  is  the 
central  fact  of  Christianity.  Paul  will  know  nothing 
but  Christ,  and  him  crucified;  God  forbid  that  he 
should  glory,  save  in  the  Cross  of  Jesus,  his  Lord ! 
When  Lowell  travesties  the  suffering  love  of  a  holy 
God,  he  not  only  goes  beyond  the  bounds  of  rational 
criticism,  but  he  discredits  the  only  effective  appeal  to 
sinful  hearts.  How  infinitely  superior  to  this  ridicule, 
as  a  merely  ethical  instrument  for  man's  betterment,  is 
the  Christian  hymn : 

"  Weary  of  earth,  and  laden  with  my  sin, 
I  look  at  heav'n  and  long  to  enter  in; 
But  there  no  evil  thing  may  find  a  home; 
And  yet  I  hear  a  voice  that  bids  me  '  Come.' 


It  is  the  voice  of  Jesus  that  I  hear; 

His  are  the  hands  stretched  out  to  draw  me  near, 

And  his  the  blood  that  can  for  all  atone, 

And  set  me  faultless  there  before  the  throne. 


[  Yes,  thou  wilt  answer  for  me,  Righteous  Lord! 
Thine  all  the  merits,  mine  the  great  reward! 
Thine  the  sharp  thorns,  but  mine  the  golden  crown; 
Mine  the  life  won,  but  thine  the  life  laid  down! " 


ARE    RELIGION    AND    POETRY    ANTITHETICAL?    3!  I 

It  is  fortunate  that,  in  spite  of  these  defects,  we  can 
praise  so  large  a  portion  of  Lowell's  work.  Though 
evangelical  theology  had  lost  its  hold  upon  him,  its 
ethics  still  survived.  He  felt  their  pull,  and  fancied 
that  they  drew  him  away  from  poetry.  In  1865  he 
writes : 

I  shall  never  be  a  poet  till  I  get  out  of  the  pulpit;  and  New 
England  was  all  meeting-house  when  I  was  growing  up. 
But  I  assure  you  I  am  never  dull,  but  in  spite  of  myself.  .  . 
Believe  me,  I  was  lively  once,  and  may  recover  it;  but  I  fear 
me  I  have  suffered  a  professor-change  that  has  gone  too 
deep  for  healing  I  am  perfectly  conscious  of  it,  and  cannot 
yet  help  it. 

All  this  suggests  the  question  whether  ethics  and 
poetry,  or  religion  and  poetry,  are  antithetical  to  each 
other.  Can  a  great  poet  have  a  moral  purpose  in  his 
writing?  Is  the  greatest  poetry  free  from  all  intent 
to  benefit  mankind  and  to  honor  God?  Was  the 
"  Paradise  Lost "  less  of  a  poem,  because  it  treated 

"  Of  Man's  first  disobedience,  and  the  fruit 
Of  that  forbidden  tree,  whose  mortal  taste 
Brought  death  into  the  world,  and  all  our  woe, 
With  loss  of  Eden,  till  one  greater  Man 
Restore  us,  and  regain  the  blissful  seat?" 

Was  "  The  Divine  Comedy  "  less  worthy  of  praise  be- 
cause it  professed  to  show  the  way  from  hell  to  heaven  ? 
Is  Hebrew  poetry  less,  or  more,  poetical,  because  it  is 
full  of  the  divine  Spirit,  and  aims  at  bringing  man  into 
communion  with  God?  It  really  is  the  old  question  of 
"  Art  for  Art's  sake,"  or  "  Art  for  God's  sake."  I 
think  we  can  make  but  one  answer :  Poetry  is  great, 
just  in  proportion  as  it  reflects  the  innermost  reality; 


312    LOWELL  A  GREATER  POET  IF  A  GREATER  MAN 

and  no  poetry  is  great  that  does  not  bring  the  finite 
mind  into  contact  and  communication  with  the  infinite 
Intelligence.  Poetry  indeed  is  the  vision  of  the  ideal 
which  lies  at  the  basis  of  the  real,  and  the  expression 
of  that  ideal  in  answering  forms  of  melody  and  num- 
ber. Poetry  demands  for  its  organ  a  complete  man- 
hood, and  an  atrophied  religious  nature  is  shorn  of 
its  proper  insight  and  power.  Only  a  coal  from  off 
the  altar  of  sacrifice  can  touch  the  lips  with  heavenly 
fire.  Lowell  would  have  been  a  greater  poet  if  he 
had  been  a  greater  theologian  and  a  greater  man.  His 
influence  will  be  fleeting,  just  in  proportion  as  he 
lacked  knowledge  of  himself  and  of  God. 

The  essence  of  religion  is  humility — a  humility  that 
confesses  its  sinfulness  and  its  dependence  upon  the 
divine  mercy,  and  that  submissively  accepts  pardon  and 
renewal  in  God's  appointed  -way.  Such  penitence  and 
faith,  in-  Jew  or  Gentile,  whether  conscious  or  uncon- 
scious, are  really  faith  in  Christ,  the  Way,  the  Truth, 
and  the  Life ;  and  they  make  the  soul  receptive  to  the  di- 
vine Spirit.  Self-righteousness  and  self-dependence,  on 
the  other  hand,  while  they  may  attract  the  praise  and 
even  the  loyalty  of  men,  are  a  bar  to  the  entrance  of  the 
divine  Spirit.  Receptivity  ceases,  when  a  Stoic  pride 
vaunts  its  own  sufficiency.  The  great  poets  have  al- 
ways courted  the  Muses — the  pseudonym  for  God — 
and  have  attributed  their  best  work  to  a  higher  Power 
than  themselves.  Yet  human  faculties  still  work  on, 
when  this  connection  with  God  is  broken;  a  sort  of 
mental  inertia  keeps  the  machinery  in  motion ;  and  we 
have  poetry  written  by  ungodly  men.  Let  us  be  thank- 
ful that  so  much  of  it  is  helpful,  though  it  conies  short 


LOWELL'S  SERVICE  FROM  INHERITED  FAITH   3*3 

of  the  highest  excellence.  I  make  no  doubt  that 
Lowell's  stand  for  American  democracy  is  a  valuable 
contribution  to  literature  and  to  politics.  We  are  more 
independent  of  foreign  opinion,  and  more  ready  to  fight 
for  our  principles,  by  reason  of  his  appeals.  That  the 
United  States  has  come  to  be  a  world-power,  and  is 
conscious  of  its  rights  and  dignity  in  the  family  of  na- 
tions, is  in  some  measure  due  to  Lowell.  This  sense 
of  civic  dignity,  like  that  of  old  when  to  be  a  Roman 
was  to  be  greater  than  a  king,  rests,  in  Lowell's  case, 
in  spite  of  some  theological  aberrations,  upon  his  an- 
cestral and  inherited  theistic  faith.  In  his  "  Ode  for 
the  Fourth  of  July,  1876,"  the  concluding  verses  make 
this  plain : 

God  of  our  fathers,  Thou  who  wast, 

Art,  and  shalt  be  when  those  eye-wise  who  flout 

Thy  secret  presence  shall  be  lost 

In  the  great  light  that  dazzles  them  to  doubt, 

We,  sprung  from  loins  of  stalwart  men 

Whose  strength  was  in  their  trust 

That  Thou  wouldst  make  thy  dwelling  in  their  dust 

And  walk  with  those  a  fellow-citizen 

Who  build  a  city  of  the  just, 

We,  who  believe  Life's  bases  rest 

Beyond  the  probe  of  chemic  test, 

Still,  like  our  fathers,  feel  Thee  near, 

Sure  that,  while  lasts  the  immutable  decree, 

The  land  to  Human  Nature  dear 

Shall  not  be  unbeloved  of  Thee. 

I  have  been  dealing  with  Lowell  simply  as  a  poet, 
and  have  endeavored  to  show  how  his  training  and  his 
religious  beliefs  influenced  his  verse.  We  must  remem- 
ber that  his  later  life  was  not  that  of  the  poet,  but 
rather  that  of  the  student  of  politics  and  the  man  of 


314  "  T0    JOHN    GORHAM    PALFREY  " 

public  affairs.  He  was  greater  as  an  essayist  than  as  a 
poet.  The  instincts  of  the  poet,  however,  never  de- 
serted him.  The  warmth  of  his  affection  was  almost 
ideal,  and  it  best  expressed  itself  in  memorial  verses  in 
honor  of  his  friends.  These  verses  show  how  greatly 
he  valued  courage  and  faithfulness  in  defense  of  the 
right,  and  they  have  a  distinctly  ethical  character. 
The  first  of  these  poems  is  addressed  "  To  John  Gorham 
Palfrey,"  who  had  bolted  from  his  party  rather  than 
support  a  candidate  submissive  to  the  encroachments 
of  slavery  : 

There  are  who  triumph  in  a  losing  cause, 
Who  can  put  on  defeat,  as  't  were  a  wreath 
Unwithering  in  the  adverse  popular  breath, 

Safe  from  the  blasting  demagogue's  applause; 

'T  is  they  who  stand  for  freedom  and  God's  laws. 

And  so  stands  Palfrey  now,  as  Marvell  stood, 
Loyal  to  Truth  dethroned,  nor  could  be  wooed 
To  trust  the  playful  tiger's  velvet  paws. 


Oh  for  a  whiff  of  Naseby,  that  would  sweep, 
With  its  stern  Puritan  besom,  all  this  chaff 
From  the  Lord's  threshing-floor!  Yet  more  than 

half 

The  victory  is  attained,  when  one  or  two, 
Through  the  fool's  laughter  and  the  traitor's 

scorn, 

Beside  thy  sepulchre  can  bide  the  morn, 
Crucified  Truth,  when  thou  shalt  rise  anew! 

Lowell  sided  with  the  weak  who  seemed  to  have  no 
helper.  His  verses  "  To  W.  L.  Garrison  "  depict  the 
pitiful  resources,  but  the  indomitable  will,  of  the  first 
anti-slavery  reformers : 


LOWELL'S  TRIBUTES  TO  HIS  FRIENDS         315 

In  a  small  chamber,  friendless  and  unseen, 
Toiled  o'er  his  types  one  poor,  unlearned  young 
man; 

The  place  was  dark,  unfurnitured,  and  mean; 
Yet  there  the  freedom  of  a  race  began. 


O  small  beginnings,  ye  are  great  and  strong, 
Based  on  a  faithful  heart  and  weariless  brain! 

Ye  build  the  future  fair,  ye  conquer  wrong, 
Ye  earn  the  crown,  and  wear  it  not  in  vain. 

There  is  a  sonnet  which  must  not  be  omitted,  if  we  are 
to  give  any  proper  account  of  Lowell's  friends.  It  is 
addressed  to  "  Wendell  Phillips  " : 

He  stood  upon  the  world's  broad  threshold;  wide 

The  din  of  battle  and  of  slaughter  rose; 

He  saw  God  stand  upon  the  weaker  side, 

That  sank  in  seeming  loss  before  its  foes: 

Many  there  were  who  made  great  haste  and  sold 

Unto  the  cunning  enemy  their  swords, 

He  scorned  their  gifts  of  fame,  and  power,  and  gold, 

And,  underneath  their  soft  and  flowery  words, 

Heard  the  cold  serpent  hiss;  therefore  he  went 

And  humbly  joined  him  to  the  weaker  part, 

Fanatic  named,  and  fool,  yet  well  content 

So  he  could  be  the  nearer  to  God's  heart, 

And  feel  its  solemn  pulses  sending  blood 

Through  all  the  widespread  veins  of  endless  good. 


And  I  must  also,  in  all  fairness,  quote  parts  of  the 
poem  which  he  wrote  to  his  best  friend,  his  lifelong 
companion  and  colleague,  and  the  editor  of  his  "  Life 
and  Letters  " — I  refer  of  course  to  Charles  Eliot  Nor- 
ton, from  whom  much  of  my  material  has  been  taken, 
and  whose  dominating  intelligence  and  friendly  criti- 
cism had  greater  influence  with  Lowell  than  those  of 


3l6  THE    MODESTY    OF   LOWELL 

any  other.  This  poem  is  the  poet's  humble  confession 
of  his  own  shortcoming  at  the  age  of  forty-nine,  when 
poetry  began  to  seem  a  thing  of  the  past,  and  his  more 
strenuous  public  life  was  opening  before  him : 

The  wind  is  roistering  out  of  doors, 

My  windows  shake  and  my  chimney  roars; 

My  Elmwood  chimneys  seem  crooning  to  me, 

As  of  old,  in  their  moody,  minor  key, 

And  out  of  the  past  the  hoarse  wind  blows, 

As  I  sit  in  my  arm-chair,  and  toast  my  toes. 

"O  dream-ship-builder!  where  are  they  all, 
Your  grand  three-deckers,  deep-chested  and  tall, 
That  should  crush  the  waves  under  canvas  piles, 
And  anchor  at  last  by  the  Fortunate  Isles? 
There's  gray  in  your  beard,  the  years  turn  foes, 
While  you  muse  in  your  arm-chair,  and  toast  your 
toes." 

I  sit  and  dream  that  I  hear,  as  of  yore, 

My  Elmwood  chimneys'  deep-throated  roar; 

If  much  be  gone,  there  is  much  remains; 

By  the  embers  of  loss  I  count  my  gains, 

You  and  yours  with  the  best,  till  the  old  hope  glows 

In  the  fanciful  flame,  as  I  toast  my  toes. 

Instead  of  a  fleet  of  broad-browed  ships, 

To  send  a  child's  armada  of  chips! 

Instead  of  the  great  guns,  tier  on  tier, 

A  freight  of  pebbles  and  grass-blades  sere! 

"  Well,  maybe  more  love  with  the  less  gift  goes," 

I  growl,  as,  half  moody,  I  toast  my  toes. 

It  is  the  natural  modesty  of  the  man  which  sees,  in 
what  has  been  accomplished,  only  the  suggestion  of  the 
greater  work  that  might  have  been.  One  of  the  most 
pleasing  indications,  indeed,  of  Lowell's  real  character 
is  to  be  found  in  his  criticism  of  himself.  It  was  in- 


THE    SHORTCOMINGS    OF   LOWELL  317 

eluded  in  "  A  Fable  for  Critics,"  in  order  to  prevent 
the  public  from  suspecting  him  as  its  author.  I  have 
already  pointed  out  the  elements  of  truth  and  of  error 
which  it  represents,  and  with  it  my  essay  may  close : 

"  There  is  Lowell,  who's  striving  Parnassus  to  climb 
With  a  whole  bale  of  isms  tied  together  with  rhyme, 
He  might  get  on  alone,  spite  of  brambles  and  boulders, 
But  he  can't  with  that  bundle  he  has  on  his  shoulders, 
The  top  of  the  hill  he  will  ne'er  come  nigh  reaching 
Till  he  learns  the  distinction  'twixt  singing  and 

preaching; 

His  lyre  has  some  chords  that  would  ring  pretty  well, 
But  he'd  rather  by  half  make  a  drum  of  the  shell, 
And  rattle  away  till  he's  old  as  Methusalem, 
At  the  head  of  a  march  to  the  last  new  Jerusalem." 

This  is  a  modest  estimate  of  himself.  But  he  does  not 
understand  the  reason  for  his  shortcomings.  It  was 
not  his  preaching  that  spoiled  his  poetry,  but  rather 
the  fact  that  he  had  so  little  truth  to  preach.  He  was 
a  moralist  and  a  patriot,  but  his  morality  and  patriotism 
were  not  sufficiently  grounded  in  religious  faith.  God 
was  to  him  too  much  of  a  Nature-God,  and  too  little 
the  God  of  the  Christian  revelation.  The  result  was 
narrowness  of  range  and  deficiency  in  depth.  He  saw 
that  "  the  powers  that  be  are  ordained  of  God  " ;  but 
he  did  not  see  in  Christ's  sacrifice  the  motive  for  obedi- 
ence, or  the  power  to  make  men  loyal.  His  appeals  to 
good  men  are  stirring,  but  when  they  fall  upon  unwill- 
ing ears  they  are  drowned  by  the  outcries  of  selfishness. 
His  poetry  would  be  more  impressive  and  more  last- 
ing, if  there  were  in  it  that  vision  of  the  Holy  One 
which  he  lacked,  and  that  inspiration  of  the  Hebrew 
prophets  which  he  denied. 


VII 
OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES 


LORD  MACAULAY  defines  wit  as  the  power  of  per- 
ceiving analogies  between  things  which  appear  to  have 
nothing  in  common.  We  ought  to  add  a  second  power 
of  apt  expression,  such  as  creates  surprise  or  pleasure. 
How  shall  we  distinguish  wit  from  humor?  Mainly 
by  the  difference  in  their  intellectual  and  emotional 
accompaniments.  Both  wit  and  humor  are  products 
of  the  imagination.  But  wit  is  often  cynical,  while 
humor  is  compassionate;  wit  can  discharge  stinging 
shafts,  while  humor  is  always  kindly;  wit  is  more  a 
matter  of  intellect,  humor  a  matter  of  affection. 
Thackeray  called  humor  a  mixture  of  love  and  wit, 
and  named  Dickens  as  its  representative.  We  have 
seen  how  greatly  James  Russell  Lowell  was  indebted 
to  wit,  as  his  instrument  in  poetry.  We  may  with 
equal  truth  speak  of  humor  as  the  chief  gift  of  Oliver 
Wendell  Holmes.  As  we  called  Lowell  our  poetical 
moralist,  we  may  call  Holmes  our  poetical  humorist. 

Our  poet  was  a  great  believer  in  heredity;  and,  in 
spite  of  his  dislike  to  Calvinism,  he  furnished  in  him- 
self a  demonstration  of  its  doctrine  with  regard  to  the 
transmission  of  hereditary  traits.  The  element  of 
vivacity  in  his  mental  composition  was  almost  certainly 
derived  from  his  mother,  Sarah  Wendell ;  and  his  bent 
to  poetry  may  be  plausibly  explained  as  an  inheritance 
from  Anne  Bradstreet,  who  was  called  "  the  tenth 

321 


322  "  DOROTHY    Q.  ' 

Muse  "  in  New  England,  and  who  was  a  remoter  an- 
cestor. Dorothy  Quincy  came  nearer  to  Oliver  in 
point  of  time;  and  he  possessed  a  portrait  of  her 
which  he  has  made  famous  in  his  verses  entitled 
"  Dorothy  Q." — verses  so  sweet  and  so  characteristic 
of  his  genius,  that  a  few  of  their  lines  at  least  must 
not  be  omitted : 

Grandmother's  mother;  her  age,  I  guess, 
Thirteen  summers,  or  something  less; 
Girlish  bust,  but  womanly  air; 
Smooth,  square  forehead  with  uprolled  hair; 
Lips  that  lover  has  never  kissed; 
Taper  fingers  and  slender  wrist; 
Hanging  sleeves  of  stiff  brocade; 
So  they  painted  the  little  maid. 


O  Damsel  Dorothy!     Dorothy  Q.! 
Strange  is  the  gift  that  I  owe  to  you; 
Such  a  gift  as  never  a  king 
Save  to  daughter  or  son  might  bring, — 
All  my  tenure  of  heart  and  hand, 
All  my  title  to  house  and  land; 
Mother  and  sister  and  child  and  wife 
And  joy  and  sorrow  and  death  and  life! 

What  if  a  hundred  years  ago 

Those  close-shut  lips  had  answered  No, 

When  forth  the  tremulous  question  came 

That  cost  the  maiden  her  Norman  name, 

And  under  the  folds  that  look  so  still 

The  bodice  swelled  with  the  bosom's  thrill? 

Should  I  be  I,  or  would  it  be 

One  tenth  another,  to  nine  tenths  me? 


Our  poet's  father,  Dr.  Abiel  Holmes,  was  a  man  of 
very  different  type  from  his  wife.  While  she  was 
bright,  and  full  of  the  modern  views  then  current  in 


THE    PARENTS    OF    HOLMES  323 

New  England,  he  represented  the  old-fashioned  Cal- 
vinism. He  was  born  in  Connecticut,  and  he  gradu- 
ated at  Yale.  He  married  for  his  first  wife  the 
daughter  of  Doctor  Stiles,  the  president  of  the  college. 
For  several  years  he  exercised  his  ministry  in  Georgia, 
the  most  conservative  region  of  the  South.  Then  he 
returned  to  the  North,  and  became  pastor  of  the  First 
Congregational  Church  of  Cambridge.  Ten  years 
afterward  he  married  his  second  wife,  and  nine  years 
after  that  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  was  born.  "  The 
Old  Gambrel-roofed  House  "  which  he  has  so  feelingly 
commemorated,  was  the  scene  of  solemn  lessons  in  the 
Westminster  Catechism,  which  were  given  by  his 
mother,  although  on  her  part  with  many  a  mental 
reservation — for  she  declared  in  later  years  to  an  old 
friend  and  servant,  "  Well,  Mary,  I  don't  know,  but 
I  am  as  good  an  Universalist  as  any  of  you !  "  Her 
son  seems  to  have  her  in  mind  when  he  writes :  "  She, 
too,  is  the  New  England  elm  with  the  iron  band  welded 
round  it  when  it  was  a  sapling!  But  how  she  has 
grown  in  spite  of  it !  " 

The  father  was  a  handsome  man,  of  gracious  man- 
ners but  quiet  dignity.  He  wrote  some  dull  verses,  as 
many  clergymen  of  his  day  innocently  did.  He  was 
the  author  of  a  book  entitled  "  Annals  of  America,"-  an 
accurate  and  trustworthy  narrative  of  our  national 
history.  But  those  were  days  of  theological  contro- 
versy. Doctor  Holmes  thought  himself  set  for  the 
defense  of  orthodox  doctrine.  His  chief  aim  was  to 
preach  what  he  regarded  as  Scripture  truth,  whether 
men  would  hear  or  forbear.  He  did  this  with  com- 
parative mildness,  and  his  son  might  possibly  have 


324      HOLMES  S    EARLY   DISLIKE    FOR    CALVINISM 

remained  a  believer,  if  it  had  not  been  for  the  oc- 
casional visits  of  clergymen  who  went  to  hyper-Cal- 
vinistic  extremes.  Their  minatory  preaching  and 
their  lugubrious  demeanor  repelled  the  sprightly  boy, 
and  he  vowed  to  oppose  and  deride  their  doctrine.  He 
outgrew  the  teaching  of  his  father.  From  subordi- 
nation he  achieved  complete  independence,  yet  without 
sundering  the  filial  bond  which  united  them. 

In  his  "  Autobiographical  Notes,"  which  unfortu- 
nately do  not  extend  beyond  his  college  days,  he  has 
given  us  a  very  interesting  account  of  his  boyish  read- 
ing. His  father  had  a  library  of  from  one  to  two 
thousand  volumes.  The  great  English  classics — his- 
torians, poets,  and  preachers — were  there,  and  Rees's 
"  Encyclopaedia  "  gave  a  summary  of  all  human  knowl- 
edge. Into  all  these  the  boy  dipped,  without  attempt- 
ing to  read  any  one  of  them  through.  Scott's  "  Family 
Bible,"  and  Bunyan's  "  Pilgrim's  Progress,"  wakened 
his  antipathy,  by  what  he  thought  their  narrowness 
and  exclusiveness.  An  original  "  Paradise  "  and  the 
"  Fall  of  Man  "  to  him  became  fables.  Already  the 
study  of  physical  science  interested  him  more  than 
did  the  views  of  theologians.  Unitarianism  showed  its 
ill  effects  in  his  case,  by  making  him  a  materialistic 
rather  than  an  idealistic  skeptic.  In  giving  account  of 
himself  in  those  early  days  he  writes  : 

The  effect  of  Calvinistic  training  on  different  natures  va- 
ries very  much.  The  majority  take  the  creed  as  a  horse 
takes  his  collar;  it  slips  by  his  ears,  over  his  neck,  he  hardly 
knows  how,  but  he  finds  himself  in  harness,  and  jogs  along  as 
his  fathers  and  forefathers  have  done  before  him.  A  certain 
number  become  enthusiasts  in  its  behalf,  and,  believing  them- 
selves the  subjects  of  divine  illumination,  become  zealous 


THE    SCHOOL    DAYS    OF    HOLMES  325 

ministers  and  devoted  missionaries.  Here  and  there  a 
stronger-minded  one  revolts  with  the  whole  strength  of  his 
nature  from  the  inherited  servitude  of  his  ancestry,  and  gets 
rid  of  his  whole  harness  before  he  is  at  peace  with  himself, 
though  a  few  shreds  may  hold  to  him. 

Oliver's  earliest  memory  was  of  the  Declaration  of 
Peace  between  England  and  the  United  States,  in  1815, 
when  he  was  six  years  old.  He  threw  up  his  cap  at 
the  illumination  of  the  colleges,  as  he  was  coming 
from  the  dame-school.  A  little  later  he  came  under 
the  tutelage  of  William  Biglow,  the  Master  of  the  Bos- 
ton Latin  School.  The  boy  seems  to  have  been  an  apt 
scholar,  in  spite  of  his  constant  whispering;  for  the 
master,  in  passing,  tapped  him  on  the  forehead  with 
his  pencil  as  his  only  punishment,  saying  that  he 
couldn't  help  it,  "  if  I  would  do  so  well."  After  the 
Boston  Latin  School  came  the  Phillips  Andover 
Academy.  His  poem  "  The  School-Boy,"  read  in  1878, 
at  the  Centennial  Celebration  of  the  founding  of  the 
Academy,  tells  us  the  feelings  with  which  he  began 
his  studies  away  from  home : 

My  cheek  was  bare  of  adolescent  down 
When  first  I  sought  the  academic  town;' 
Slow  rolls  the  coach  along  the  dusty  road, 
Big  with  its  filial  and  parental  load; 
The  frequent  hills,  the  lonely  woods  are  past, 
The  school-boy's  chosen  home  is  reached  at  last. 

Homesick  as  death!    Was  ever  pang  like  this?  .  . 
Too  young  as  yet  with  willing  feet  to  stray 
From  the  tame  fireside,  glad  to  get.  away, — 
Too  old  to  let  my  watery  grief  appear, — 
And  what  so  bitter  as  a  swallowed  tear! 


326  THE    HARVARD    CLASS    OF    1829 

You  were  a  school-boy — what  beneath  the  sun 
So  like  a  monkey?    I  was  also  one. 

In  1825,  at  the  age  of  sixteen,  he  entered  Harvard 
College.  The  Class  of  1829  was  a  notable  one.  It 
had  fifty-nine  members.  Among  them  were  G.  T. 
Bigelow,  afterwards  Chief  Justice  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  Massachusetts ;  F.  B.  Crowninshielcl,  Speaker 
of  the  Massachusetts  House  of  Representatives ;  G.  VV. 
Richardson,  Mayor  of  Worcester ;  G.  F.  Davis,  Mem- 
ber of  Congress;  James  Freeman  Clarke,  the  well- 
known  preacher  and  writer;  Benjamin  Peirce,  the 
famous  professor,  whom  Holmes  describes  as  the  "  boy 
with  a  grave  mathematical  look  " ;  B.  R.  Curtis,  of 
the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States,  the  "boy 
with  a  three-decker  brain  " ;  S.  F.  Smith,  author  of 
"  My  Country,  'tis  of  Thee,"  "  nice  youngster  of  excel- 
lent pith."  It  was  a  day  of  rollicking  good-fellowship, 
and  the  use  of  alcoholic  stimulants,  which  was  still 
common,  made  this  fraternity  the  easier.  Then  began 
a  series  of  class-songs  and  class-poems,  in  which  the 
bacchanalian  element  is  more  pronounced  than  we  find 
it  in  our  latter  days ;  it  was  even  then,  indeed,  more  of 
a  pretense  than  a  reality.  Holmes  was  chosen  class- 
poet,  and  he  magnified  his  office,  for  I  find  forty-four 
successive  poems  which  he  read  at  the  annual  reunions 
of  his  class,  until  at  the  last  meeting,  in  1889,  only 
three  survivors  were  present.  I  quote  from  the  poem 
which  introduces,  and  from  the  poem  which  closes  the 
series.  The  first  is  entitled  "  Bill  and  Joe  "  : 

Come,  dear  old  comrade,  you  and  I 
Will  steal  an  hour  from  days  gone  by, 
The  shining  days  when  life  was  new, 


CLASS-POEMS    OF    HOLMES  327 

And  all  was  bright  with  morning  dew, 
The  lusty  days  of  long  ago, 
When  you  were  Bill  and  I  was  Joe. 

And  shall  we  breathe  in  happier  spheres 
The  names  that  pleased  our  mortal  ears; 
In  some  sweet  lull  of  harp  and  song 
For  earth-born  spirits  none  too  long, 
Just  whispering  of  the  world  below 
Where  this  was  Bill  and  that  was  Joe? 

No  matter;  while  our  home  is  here 
No  sounding  name  is  half  so  dear; 
When  fades  at  length  our  lingering  day, 
Who  cares  what  pompous  tombstones  say? 
Read  on  the  hearts  that  love  us  still, 
Hie  jacet  Joe.    Hie  jacet  Bill. 

The  last  of  these  class-poems  is  entitled  "  After  the 
Curfew  "  : 

The  Play  is  over.     While  the  light 

Yet  lingers  in  the  darkening  hall, 
I  come  to  say  a  last  Good-night 

Before  the  final  Exeunt  all. 

We  gathered  once,  a  joyous  throng: 
The  jovial  toasts  went  gayly  round; 

With  jest,  and  laugh,  and  shout,  and  song, 
We  made  the  floors  and  walls  resound. 

We  come  with  feeble  steps  and  slow, 

A  little  band  of  four  or  five, 
Left  from  the  wrecks  of  long  ago, 

Still  pleased  to  find  ourselves  alive. 

Alive!    How  living,  too,  are  they 
Whose  memories  it  is  ours  to  share! 

Spread  the  long  table's  full  array, — • 
There  sits  a  ghost  in  every  chair! 


328  EARLY    VERSES    OF    HOLMES 

So  ends  "  The  Boys," — a  lifelong  play. 

We  too  must  hear  the  Prompter's  call 
To  fairer  scenes  and  brighter  day: 

Farewell!     I  let  the  curtain  fall. 

Holmes  has  told  us  that  with  him  versifying  began 
even  before  he  had  learned  to  write.  His  ideas  shaped 
themselves  in  metrical  form  so  early  that  he  did  not 
know  when  the  poetic  impulse  first  seized  him.  The 
first  verses  which  appeared  in  print,  however,  seem  to 
have  been  a  translation  from  Vergil's  "  yEneid,"  made 
when  Oliver  was  a  student  in  the  academy  at  Andover. 
They  are  a  vigorous  rendering  of  the  passage  in  which 
Neptune  is  described  as  rising  to  quell  the  storm: 

The  god  looked  out  upon  the  troubled  deep 
Waked  into  tumult  from  its  placid  sleep; 
The  flame  of  anger  kindles  in  his  eye 
As  the  wild  waves  ascend  the  lowering  sky. 

Thus  by  the  power  of  his  imperial  arm 
The  boiling  ocean  trembled  into  calm; 
With  flowing  reins  the  father  sped  his  way 
And  smiled  serene  upon  rekindled  day. 

"  Old  Ironsides,"  however,  was  the  first  production 
which  drew  attention  to  him  as  a  poet.  That  was  the 
name  popularly  given  to  the  frigate  Constitution, 
which  had  fought  so  gallantly  and  successfully  in  the 
war  of  1812,  but  which  our  Navy  Department  now 
proposed  to  dismantle  and  destroy.  Holmes  was 
angered  by  this  proposition ;  he  dashed  off  some  indig- 
nant stanzas,  and  sent  them  to  the  "  Daily  Advertiser." 
They  ran  like  wildfire  through  the  newspaper  press  of 
the  country,  and  with  such  effect  that  the  tattered 


"  OLD    IRONSIDES  "  329 

ensign  of  the  old  battleship  was  not  torn  down.  The 
spirit  of  their  patriotic  lines  our  poet  never  after- 
ward surpassed : 

Ay,  tear  her  tattered  ensign  down! 

Long  has  it  waved  on  high, 
And  many  an  eye  has  danced  to  see 

That  banner  in  the  sky; 
Beneath  it  rung  the  battle  shout, 

And  burst  the  cannon's  roar; — 
The  meteor  of  the  ocean  air 

Shall  sweep  the  clouds  no  more! 

Her  deck,  once  red  with  heroes'  blood, 

Where  knelt  the  vanquished  foe, 
When  winds  were  hurrying  o'er  the  flood, 

And  waves  were  white  below, 
No  more  shall  feel  the  victor's  tread, 

Or  know  the  conquered  knee; — 
The  harpies  of  the  shore  shall  pluck 

The  eagle  of  the  sea! 

Oh,  better  that  her  shattered  hulk 

Should  sink  beneath  the  wave; 
Her  thunders  shook  the  mighty  deep, 

And  there  should  be  her  grave; 
Nail  to  the  mast  her  holy  flag, 

Set  every  threadbare  sail, 
And  give  her  to  the  god  of  storms, 

The  lightning  and  the  gale! 

But  it  was  not  in  epic  or  heroic  poetry  that  Holmes 
excelled.  The  distinctly  humorous  was  his  forte,  and 
it  is  noticeable  that  some  of  his  best  work  in  this  line 
was  done  in  his  very  early  manhood.  Even  in  his 
latest  years  he  never  surpassed  .the  sprightliness  and 
pathos  of  "  The  Last  Leaf,"  which  was  written  only 
two  years  after  his  graduation  from  college : 


330  "  THE    LAST    LEAF  " 

I  saw  him  once  before, 
As  he  passed  by  the  door, 

And  again 

The  pavement  stones  resound, 
As  he  totters  o'er  the  ground 

With  his  cane. 

They  say  that  in  his  prime, 
Ere  the  pruning-knife  of  Time 

Cut  him  down, 
Not  a  better  man  was  found 
By  the  Crier  on  his  round 

Through  the  town. 

But  now  he  walks  the  streets, 
And  he  looks  at  all  he  meets 

Sad  and  wan. 

And  he  shakes  his  feeble  head, 
That  it  seems  as  if  he  said, 

"  They  are  gone." 

The  mossy  marbles  rest 

On  the  lips  that  he  has  prest 

In  their  bloom, 

And  the  names  he  loved  to  hear 
Have  been  carved  for  many  a  year 

On  the  tomb. 

My  grandmamma  has  said — 
Poor  old  lady,  she  is  dead 

Long  ago — 

That  he  had  a  Roman  nose, 
And  his  cheek  was  like  a  rose 

In  the  snow; 

But  now  his  nose  is  thin, 
And  it  rests  upon  his  chin 

Like  a  staff, 

And  a  crook  is  in  his  back, 
And  a  melancholy  crack 

In  his  laugh. 


HOLMES    A    MEDICAL    STUDENT    IN    PARIS          33! 

I  know  it  is  a  sin 

For  me  to  sit  and  grin 

At  him  here; 

But  the  old  three-cornered  hat, 
And  the  breeches,  and  all  that, 

Are  so  queer! 

And  if  I  should  live  to  be 
"The  last  leaf  upon  the  tree 

In  the  spring, 

Let  them  smile,  as  I  do  now, 
At  the  old  forsaken  bough 

Where  I  cling. 

For  a  twelvemonth  after  his  graduation  from  col- 
lege Holmes  studied  law.  But  with  no  heartiness. 
"The  seductions  of  verse-writing/'  as  he  says,  made 
the  year  "  less  profitable  than  it  should  have  been." 
From  the  law  he  turned  to  'medicine.  After  two 
courses  of  lectures  at  a  private  medical  school  in  Bos- 
ton, he  spent  two  years  in  Paris,  the  necessary  funds 
being  furnished  by  his  well-to-do  mother,  the  daughter 
of  a  prosperous  Boston  merchant.  He  seems  tc  have 
been  reasonably  industrious,  and  to  have  made  good 
use  of  his  opportunities  for  medical  education.  Liter- 
ature had  not  yet  appeared  to  him  as  a  possible  voca- 
tion. The  physical  and  mechanical  always  interested 
him  more  than  did  the  philosophical  or  the  religious. 
In  Paris  he  saw  the  great  actors,  singers,  and  dancers ; 
he  afterward  regretted  that  he  did  not  seek  out  the 
celebrities  in  politics,  letters,  and  science.  But  he  de- 
voted himself  to  his  profession;  stored  up  as  much 
learning  as  good  health  and  good  spirits  would  permit; 
had  some  vacation  experiences  on  the  Rhine,  in  Italy, 
and  in  England ;  and  returned  to  America  with  a  small 


332  "  NUX    POSTCGENATICA  " 

but  select  professional  library,  with  a  modest  stock  of 
surgical  instruments,  and  "  with  two  skeletons  and 
some  skulls." 

Then  began  twelve  years  of  medical  practice.  He 
was  somewhat  handicapped  by  what  seemed  to  many  a 
lack  of  seriousness.  When  he  invited  the  patronage 
of  his  friends  by  saying  that  the  smallest  fevers  were 
thankfully  received,  they  doubted  the  propriety  of 
putting  their  families  under  the  care  of  a  jesting  physi- 
cian. In  his  poem  entitled  "  Ntix  Postcoenatica,"  he 
alluded  to  this  bar  in  the  way  of  his  success : 

Besides — my  prospects — don't  you  know  that  people  won't 

employ 

A  man  that  wrongs  his  manliness  by  laughing  like  a  boy? 
And  suspect  the  azure  blossom  that  unfolds  upon  a  shoot, 
As  if  wisdom's  old  potato  could  not  flourish  at  its  root? 

It's  a  vastly  pleasing  prospect,  when  you're  screwing  out  a 

laugh, 

That  your  very  next  year's  income  is  diminished  by  a  half, 
And  a  little  boy  trips  barefoot  that  your  Pegasus  may  go, 
And  the  baby's  milk  is  watered  that  your  Helicon  may  flow. 

But  he  made  few  efforts  to  extend  his  list  of  pa- 
tients. Whether  influenced  by  tenderness  of  heart 
in  view  of  suffering,  or  by  disinclination  to  endure 
watching  and  irregular  hours,  he  contented  himself 
with  jogging  on  in  a  quiet  way  and  letting  others  do 
the  hard  work.  He  thought  the  greatest  advantage  he 
derived  from  his  official  duties  was  the  comfort  of 
riding  around,  after  a  rather  lively  animal,  in  a  "  one- 
hoss-shay." 

Seemingly  careless  and  indolent,  Holmes  was  not- 
withstanding a  reader  and  observer,  and  he  gradually 


HOLMES  THE  LECTURER,  ESSAYIST,  AND  POET    333 

won  his  way  to  recognition  in  his  profession.  He  gave 
a  few  lectures  at  Dartmouth  College.  Harvard  at 
length  offered  him  its  chair  of  anatomy.  Then  he  set- 
tled down  into  the  regular  lecturing  which  lasted  for 
thirty-five  years,  and  ended  only  when  he  gave  himself 
wholly  to  literature  in  1882.  His  standing  in  the  scien- 
tific world  is  certified  by  his  three  "  Boylston  Prize 
Dissertations,"  and  by  his  essays  on  malarial  and 
puerperal  fevers.  His  humor  found  play  in  a  spicy 
attack  on  homeopathy,  and  in  frequent  poems  read  at 
the  banquets  of  medical  societies.  Some  of  these 
poems  seem  gruesome  to  the  laity;  but  I  venture  to 
quote  from  one  of  the  most  pleasing — I  mean  the  poem 
which  the  author  read  at  the  dinner  given  him  at  the 
age  of  seventy-four  by  the  medical  profession  of  the 
city  of  New  York: 

How  can  I  tell  you,  O  my  loving  friends! 

What  light,  what  warmth,  your  joyous  welcome  lends 

To  life's  late  hour?     Alas!  my  song  is  sung, 

Its  fading  accents  falter  on  my  tongue. 

Sweet  friends,  if,  shrinking  in  the  banquet's  blaze, 

Your  blushing  guest  must  face  the  breath  of  praise, 

Speak  not  too  well  of  one  who  scarce  will  know 

Himself  transfigured  in  its  roseate  glow; 

Say  kindly  of  him  what  is,  chiefly,  true, 

Remembering  always  he  belongs  to  you; 

Deal  with  him  as  a  truant,  if  you  will, 

But  claim  him,  keep  him,  call  him  brother  still! 

Holmes's  poetry  would  never  have  made  him 
famous,  if  it  had  not  been  for  his  prose.  It  was  his 
prose  which  first  drew  general  attention  to  his  poetry; 
some  of  his  best  poetry,  indeed,  was  embedded  in  his 
prose,  and  illuminated  it.  Let  us  review  the  situation 


334    "  THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST  TABLE  " 

when  our  poet  reached  the  age  of  forty-eight.  For 
seventeen  years  he  had  been  happily  married,  and 
there  were  three  children.  Life  had  moved  steadily 
on;  he  had  an  assured  position  in  the  scientific  and 
educational  world;  but  he  was  scarcely  known  outside 
of  Boston.  A  great  change  came  in  1857,  when  Phil- 
lips, Sampson  and  Company  determined  to  establish  a 
new  magazine,  and  invited  James  Russell  Lowell  to  be 
its  editor.  He  desired  to  make  it  a  purely  literary 
publication  of  the  highest  order,  and  he  "  made  it  a 
condition  precedent "  of  his  own  acceptance  that 
Doctor  Holmes  should  be  "  the  first  contributor  en- 
gaged." Holmes  himself  declares  that  this  flattering 
proposition  waked  him  from  a  literary  lethargy  into 
which  he  had  fallen.  He  rose  to  the  occasion;  gladly 
entered  into  this  literary  partnership;  gave  to  the 
new  periodical  its  name  of  "  The  Atlantic  Monthly." 
Lowell  afterward  asserted  that  Holmes  "  not  named, 
but  made,  '  The  Atlantic.'  "  His  first  contribution  at- 
tracted wide  and  favorable  notice.  It  was  the  first 
instalment  of  "  The  Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table." 
Holmes  was  probably  greatest  in  his  conversation, 
and  "  The  Autocrat "  most  perfectly  represented  this 
phase  of  his  genius.  Charles  Eliot  Norton  writes  of 
his  "  vivacious  wit,  throwing  off  sparks  like  an  elec- 
trical machine."  The  company  in  which  he  mingled 
was  most  favorable  for  brilliant  and  gossipy  talk. 
Norton  calls  that  particular  epoch  "  the  pleasantest 
little  oasis  of  space  and  time  "  in  New  England.  Its 
spirit  was  embodied  in  Emerson,  in  Longfellow,  in 
Holmes,  and  in  Lowell.  It  was  an  inexperienced  and 
youthful  spirit;  but  it  was  a  happy  one;  it  had  the 


"  THE   AUTOCRAT  "    A    REVIVAL  335 

charm  of  youth,  its  hope,  its  simplicity,  its  sweetness. 
Longfellow,  Lowell,  and  Holmes  were  men  of  the 
world,  but  they  were  optimists.  They  were  pro- 
foundly contented  with  themselves.  Religion  had  a 
traditional  hold  upon  them;  but  its  creeds  and  forms 
had  come  to  seem  a  bondage;  and  they  took  to  ethics 
in  place  of  theology.  They  were  lovers  of  Boston,  and 
worshipers  of  New  England.  They  cultivated  "  the 
Boston  dialect  of  the  English  language,"  and  strove  to 
make  it  universal.  It  was  Holmes  who  named  Bos- 
ton "  the  Hub  of  the  Universe."  He  was  the  center  of 
this  influential  circle  that  thought  to  liberalize  and 
civilize  the  whole  land,  and  "  The  Autocrat "  was  the 
quintessence  of  his  wit  and  wisdom. 

Yet  even  "  The  Autocrat "  was  a  revival.  At  least 
twenty  years  before  the  beginnings  of  "  The  Atlantic," 
Holmes  had  contributed  to  "  The  New  England 
Magazine  "  two  articles  with  the  same  title.  At  the 
time  they  were  little  read,  and  they  passed  into 
oblivion.  When  Lowell  asked  Holmes  to  be  his  co- 
adjutor, the  latter  was  seized  with  the  happy  thought 
of  "  shaking  the  same  bough  again,"  to  see  whether 
more  fruit  could  not  be  gotten  from  it.  He  began  his 
new  work  with  the  words:  "I  was  just  going  to  say, 
when  I  was  interrupted,"  and  thus  resumed  the  talk 
of  two  decades  past.  The  result  was  an  astonishing 
success.  The  future  of  "  The  Atlantic  "  was  assured, 
no  less  than  the  fame  of  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes. 
This  success  was  due  to  his  letting  loose  of  a  natural 
gift,  which  up  to  that  time  had  been  repressed.  His 
mind  was  discursive,  rather  than  philosophic;  more 
jocular  than  serious ;  while  yet  his  large  stores  of  read- 


336  "  THE  DEACON'S  MASTERPIECE 

ing  and  of  observation  furnished  abundant  material 
for  talk  upon  every  subject  in  heaven  or  earth.  The 
brightness  of  his  ideas,  and  the  lightness  of  his  touch 
made  his  articles  telling.  He  disclosed  the  secret  of 
his  popularity  when  he  said  that  these  papers  were 
"  dipped  from  the  running  stream  of  my  thoughts." 
The  papers  tingled  with  life;  and  they  themselves  will 
live,  as  the  noblest  product  of  their  author's  genius. 

Yet  we  must  not  forget  that  two,  at  least,  of  his 
most  charming  poems  formed  a  part  of  "  The  Auto- 
crat's "  stock.  I  quote  first  from  "  The  Deacon's 
Masterpiece,"  as  the  best  specimen  of  his  humor : 

Have  you  heard  of  the  wonderful  one-hoss  shay, 

That  was  built  in  such  a  logical  way 

It  ran  a  hundred  years  to  a  day, 

And  then,  of  a  sudden,  it — ah,  but  stay, 

I'll  tell  you  what  happened  without  delay, 

Scaring  the  parson  into  fits, 

Frightening  people  out  of  their  wits, — 

Have  you  ever  heard  of  that,  I  say? 

The  poem  gives  the  history  of  the  vehicle  through 
the  whole  century,  until  at  last  the  appointed  day  of 
its  decease  arrives : 

First  of  November,  'Fifty-five! 
This  morning  the  parson  takes  a  drive. 
Now,  small  boys,  get  out  of  the  way! 
Here  comes  the  wonderful  one-hoss  shay, 
Drawn  by  a  rat-tailed,  ewe-necked  bay. 
"Huddup!"  said  the  parson. — Off  went  they. 
The  parson  was  working  his  Sunday's  text, — 
Had  got  to  fifthly,  and  stopped  perplexed 
At  what  the — Moses — was  coming  next. 
All  at  once  the  horse  stood  still, 
Close  by  the  meet'n'-house  on  the  hill. 


"  THE    CHAMBERED    NAUTILUS  "  337 

First  a  shiver,  and  then  a  thrill, 

Then  something  decidedly  like  a  spill, — 

And  the  parson  was  sitting  upon  a  rock, 

At  half  past  nine  by  the  meet'n'-house  clock, — 

Just  the  hour  of  the  Earthquake  shock! 

What  do  you  think  the  parson  found 

When  he  got  up  and  stared  around? 

The  poor  old  chaise  in  a  heap  or  mound, 

As  if  it  had  been  to  the  mill  and  ground! 

You  see,  of  course,  if  you're  not  a  dunce, 

How  it  went  to  pieces  all  at  once, — 

All  at  once,  and  nothing  first, — 

Just  as  bubbles  do  when  they  burst. 

End  of  the  wonderful  one-hoss  shay. 
Logic  is  logic.    That's  all  I  say. 

The  Autocrat's  stock  included  also  the  best  specimen 
of  Holmes's  serious  work — I  mean  "  The  Chambered 
Nautilus."  If  he  is  to  be  judged  by  the  standard  of 
pure  poetry,  this  certainly  is  his  highest  achievement. 
I  must  therefore  differ  from  his  entertaining  biog- 
rapher, Mr.  John  T.  Morse,  Jr.,  who  gives  his  pref- 
erence to  "  The  Last  Leaf."  Holmes  was  ambitious  to 
be  thought  a  poet,  and  not  merely  a  writer  of  vcrs 
de  societe.  Of  all  his  poems,  "  The  Chambered  Nauti- 
lus "  was  his  favorite.  He  copied  it  into  a  hundred 
albums,  as  the  poem  which  best  represented  him.  His 
own  account  of  its  production  is  psychologically  inter- 
esting: 

In  writing  the  poem  I  was  filled  with  .  .  .  the  highest  state 
of  mental  exaltation  and  the  most  crystalline  clairvoyance, 
as  it  seemed  to  me,  that  had  ever  been  granted  to  me — I  mean 
that  lucid  vision  of  one's  thought,  and  of  all  forms  of  ex- 
pression which  will  be  at  once  precise  and  musical,  which  is 
the  poet's  special  gift,  however  large  or  small  in  amount  or 
value. 


338  HOLMES'S    NOVELS 

Here  too  I  can  quote  only  the  first  and  the  last  stanza : 

This  is  the  ship  of  pearl,  which,  poets  feign, 

Sails  the  unshadowed  main, — 

The  venturous  bark  that  flings 
On  the  sweet  summer  wind  its  purpled  wings 
In  gulfs  enchanted,  where  the  Siren  sings, 

And  coral  reefs  lie  bare, 
Where  the  cold  sea-maids  rise  to  sun  their 
streaming  hair. 

Build  thee  more  stately  mansions,  O  my  soul, 

As  the  swift  seasons  roll! 

Leave  thy  low-vaulted  past! 
Let  each  new  temple,  nobler  than  the  last, 
Shut  thee  from  heaven  with  a  dome  more  vast, 

Till  thou  at  length  art  free, 

Leaving  thine  outgrown  shell  by  life's  unresting 
sea! 

Some  implications  of  this  generally  noble  poem  I 
must  criticize,  when  I  come  to  speak  of  our  author's 
theological  views.  But  before  I  can  do  this  effectively, 
it  will  be  necessary  to  acquaint  the  reader  with  cer- 
tain other  prose  writings  of  Holmes.  The  success  of 
"The  Autocrat,"  of  "The  Professor,"  and  of  "The 
Poet,"  at  "  the  Breakfast  Table,"  encouraged  him  to 
make  ventures  into  the  field  of  novel  literature.  In 
the  years  between  1861  and  1885  he  wrote  and  printed 
three  works  of  fiction :  "  Elsie  Venner,"  "  The  Guard- 
ian Angel,"  and  "  A  Mortal  Antipathy."  These  novels 
gave  him  opportunity  to  express  his  religious  as  well 
as  his  ethical  convictions  in  a  more  thorough  way  than 
had  previously  been  possible.  Some  utterances  of 
"  The  Professor  at  the  Breakfast  Table "  had  pro- 
voked orthodox  criticism.  In  his  novels,  Doctor 


HOLMES    A    HATER    OF    CALVINISM  339 

Holmes  undertook  to  answer  these  criticisms  and  to 
enforce  his  own  views.  His  novels  are  "  novels  with 
a  purpose."  He  confesses  that  "  Elsie  Venner  "  was 
written  "  as  the  outcome  of  a  theory  " ;  and  he  tells 
Mrs.  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe  that  he  desired  in  it  "  to 
stir  the  mighty  question  of  automatic  agency  in  its 
relation  to  self-determination."  Holmes  is  the  most 
consciously  and  intentionally  theological  of  all  our 
poets;  and  I  do  him  no  injustice  when  I  depend  upon 
his  novels  for  explanation  of  what  is  often  enigmat- 
ical in  his  poetry. 

Our  poet  was  the  inveterate  hater  of  Calvinism,  or 
of  what  he  regarded  as  Calvinism.  The  particular 
tenet  of  Calvinism  to  which  he  objected  was  its  asser- 
tion of  inherited  moral  tendencies  to  evil.  He  main- 
tained that  inborn  tendencies  are  physical,  and  not 
moral ;  due  to  outward  influences  and  not  to  individual 
volition;  irresponsible,  and  involving  no  moral  ob- 
liquity. Calvinism  holds  that  there  is  a  universal 
hereditary  selfishness  which  originated  in  a  voluntary 
apostasy  of  the  race  from  God  at  the  beginning  of 
human  history,  and  that  the  solidarity  of  mankind 
has  transmitted  this  moral  taint  to  all  subsequent 
generations.  Holmes  endeavored  in  his  novels  to 
furnish  a  merely  physical  explanation,  which  would 
eliminate  the  element  of  morality  and  responsibility. 
"  Elsie  Venner "  is  the  story  of  a  girl  who  all  her 
life  was  the  innocent  victim  of  a  prenatal  rattlesnake 
bite,  inflicted  upon  her  mother.  The  snake-look  in 
her  eyes  was  a  deformity  and  a  hindrance  to  her 
moral  growth  and  influence,  but  it  was  not  her  fault, 
nor  the  penalty  of  any  evil  decision.  "  The  Guardian 


34O         CALVINISM    MISUNDERSTOOD    BY    HOLMES 

Angel  "  attributes  Myrtle  Hazard's  escapade,  and  her 
sudden  paroxysm  of  murderous  anger,  to  the  strain 
of  Indian  blood  in  her  veins  and  to  the  pride  of  an 
aristocratic  ancestry;  while  the  good  impulse  that 
saves  her  is  derived  from  one  of  her  forbears  who  suf- 
fered martyrdom  under  Bloody  Mary.  "  A  Mortal 
Antipathy "  explains  Maurice  Kirkwood's  misogyny 
by  the  misfortune  he  suffered  when  as  a  baby  he  was 
accidentally  dropped  by  the  pretty  girl  who  carried 
him.  His  lifelong  antipathy  to  young  women  was 
something  for  which  he  was  not  responsible — it  was 
simply  the  reaction  of  his  nervous  centers  against  all 
creatures  similar  to  her  who  caused  his  fall. 

It  needs  no  great  knowledge  of  Calvinism  to  per- 
ceive that  Holmes  misunderstood  the  system,  and  that 
his  own  explanations  of  native  abnormality  were  far 
less  satisfactory  than  those  of  Calvin  himself.  Holmes 
regarded  inherited  evil  states  as  the  natural  result  of 
some  infliction  from  without;  whereas  Calvin  held 
them  to  be  the  moral  result  of  an  apostasy  from  within. 
Holmes  explained  them  as  effects  of  prenatal  influ- 
ences derived  from  our  immediate  ancestors ;  Calvin 
referred  them  to  a  fault  on  the  part  of  the  first 
father  of  the  race,  which  transmitted  a  congenital 
selfishness  to  all  his  descendants.  Holmes  thought 
these  tendencies  to  be  merely  physical ;  Calvin  saw  in 
them  moral  unlikeness  to  God,  non-conformity  to  his 
holy  law,  and  the  germs  of  possible  and  even  of  actual 
transgression.  Our  poet's  scientific  studies  here  led 
him  astray.  He  thought  of  evil  as  something  physical. 
Man,  in  his  view,  is  diseased,  but  not  guilty.  Man  is 
not  by  nature  alienated  from  God  and  in  need  of  re- 


HEREDITY    AND    RESPONSIBILITY  34! 

demption;  and  God  is  not  the  hater  and  punisher  of 
sin,  but  only  the  compassionate  Father  who  pities  and 
saves. 

We  must  concede  that  New  England  Puritanism 
had  hardened  into  an  unpleasing  creed.  But  it  was 
hyper-Calvinistic,  rather  than  Calvinistic;  and  it  was 
this  hyper-Galvinism,  rather  than  Calvinism,  which 
Holmes  combated.  Calvin  himself  never  maintained 
that  we  are  responsible  for  the  sins  of  our  immediate 
ancestors;  and  Holmes's  argument,  if  directed  against 
real  Calvinism,  encountered  only  a  man  of  straw.  The 
federal  theory  of  imputation,  indeed,  was  expressly 
designed  to  connect  hereditary  evil  and  responsibility 
altogether  with  the  disobedience  of  our  first  progenitor. 
That  disobedience  was  a  moral  decision,  and  it  gave 
a  congenital  bias  to  his  posterity.  Subsequent  sins 
manifest,  but  they  do  not  increase,  the  hereditary  taint. 
Holmes  ignored  its  moral  quality  and  the  need  of  re- 
newal which  it  implied.  His  own  scheme  attributed 
evil  tendencies  to  unthinking  nature,  and  gave  no 
remedy  for  them,  either  in  atonement  or  in  regener- 
ation. Calvin  had  a  better  explanation  of  hereditary 
evil  traits  than  had  Holmes — an  explanation  more  con- 
sonant with  Scripture  and  with  reason.  On  the  one 
hand,  Ezekiel  declares  that  the  son  shall  not  bear  the 
iniquity  of  the  father,  and  Jesus 'says  that  the  blind 
man  was  not  born  blind  because  of  his  father's  sin. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  Psalmist  sees  in  suffering  and 
death  God's  appointed  penalty  of  sin;  Jesus  calls  Sa- 
tan a  murderer  from  the  beginning;  and  Paul  asserts 
that  by  one  man  sin  came  into  the  world,  and  death  by 
sin.  The  great  philosophers  seem  independently  to 


342      SCRIPTURE  AND  PHILOSOPHY  AGAINST  HOLMES 

repeat  the.  teaching"  of  Scripture.  Aristotle  says  "  there 
is  in  the  soul  somewhat  besides  the  reason,  which  is 
opposed  to  this,  and  fights  against  it."  Kant  speaks 
of  "  the  indwelling  of  an  evil  principle,  side  by  side 
with  the  good  one;  or,  the  radical  evil  of  human  na- 
ture." And  Bergson  traces  all  back  to  the  beginnings 
of  the  race.  In  his  "  Creative  Evolution,"  he  writes : 

"  Where  does  the  vital  principle  of  the  individual  begin  or 
end?  Gradually  we  shall  be  carried  further  and  further  back, 
up  to  the  individual's  remotest  ancestors;  we  shall  find  him 
solidary  with  each  of  them,  solidary  with  that  little  mass  of 
protoplasmic  jelly  which  is  probably  at  the  root  of  the  proto- 
plasmic tree  of  life.  Being,  to  a  certain  extent,  one  with  this 
primitive  ancestor,  he  is  also  solidary  with  all  that  descends 
from  that  ancestor  in  divergent  directions.  In  this  sense  each 
individual  may  be  said  to  remain  united  with  the  totality  of 
living  beings  by  invisible  bonds." 

And  I  may  also  quote  from  Francis  Darwin's  address 
as  President  of  the  British  Association  in  1908: 

"  The  view  upheld  by  Galton  and  Weismann  that  ontogeny 
can  only  be  changed  by  a  fundamental  upset  of  the  whole  sys- 
tem— namely,  by  an  alteration  occurring  in  its  first  stages, 
the  germ-cell — is  now  very  generally  accepted." 

Our  poet  believed  most  heartily  in  the  physical 
solidarity  of  the  human  race,  but  he  had  no  faith  in  its 
moral  solidarity.  Yet  the  latter  is  quite  as  demon- 
strable as  the  former.  Without  the  explanation  of 
inborn  se1fishness  and  suffering  which  an  original 
transgression  gives,  the  long  catalogue  of  human  ills 
must  be  regarded  as  the  work  of  a  blind  nature  and 
the  proof  of  a  godless  universe.  A  good  God  per- 
mitting man's  revolt  is  more  credible  than  is  man 


HOLMES'S   VIEW    OF   GOD    AND   OF    CHRIST        343 

mastered  by  evil  impulses  which  have  no  moral  im- 
port. Holmes  hated  Calvinism,  because  it  held  God 
to  be  the  ordainer  of  all  things.  He  accepted  a  ma- 
terialistic idealism  which  subjected  all  things  to  an 
irrational  and  fatal  necessity.  If  we  must  have  pre- 
destination, we  ought  to  prefer  the  predestination  of 
a  righteous  and  loving  God,  and  not  the  predestination 
of  a  godless  nature.  Calvinism  has  nerved  the  hearts 
of  men  to  fight  for  liberty;  fatalism  has  made  them 
cowards,  that  hugged  their  chains.  If  God  is  really  an 
omniscient  Creator,  we  must  believe  that  he  foreknew 
and  permitted  sin.  But  we  can  also  believe  that  he 
did  this  in  the  interests  of  freedom  and  virtue,  and 
that  he  will  in  the  end  justify  his  ways  to  men.  The 
predestination  of  fatalism  has  no  such  comfort.  Its 
God  is  a  Juggernaut  that  ignorantly  and  ruthlessly 
destroys. 

We  cannot  properly  estimate  Holmes's  view  of  hu- 
man sin,  unless  we  connect  it  with  his  view  of  Christ. 
He  understood  neither  the  evil  nor  the  remedy.  His 
Unitarianism  handicapped  him  at  every  step.  He  is 
a  proof  that  Christianity  without  Christ  becomes 
agnosticism  and  paganism.  Dethroning  Christ  and 
counting  him  mere  man,  the  Unitarian  is  left  with  a 
conception  of  God  so  vague  and  unmoral,  that  Stoicism 
and  self-righteousness  take  the  place  of  humility  and 
faith.  The  Cross  of  Christ  is  no  longer  the  symbol  of 
God's  holy  suffering  on  account  of  sin ;  it  becomes  the 
mere  witness  to  a  martyr's  endurance,  and  an  encour- 
agement to  suffer  for  righteousness'  sake.  Christ,  to 
the  Unitarian,  is  an  example,  but  not  a  Saviour;  not 
one  who  bore  our  sins  in  his  own  body  on  the  tree,  and 


344  UNITARIANISM    RETROGRESSIVE 

by  whose  stripes  we  are  healed;  but  only  one  who 
showed  us  how  we  may  bear  our  own  burden  of  sin 
and  suffering.  This  throws  us  back  upon  ourselves; 
puts  us  where  the  whole  world  was  in  classic  times. 
Unitarianism  is  not  progressive  but  retrogressive 
thought;  it  returns  to  Judaism  and  paganism;  so  far 
as  its  hope  of  salvation  is  concerned, 'Christ  has  lived 
and  died  in  vain.  His  life  and  death,  indeed,  are 
regarded  as  the  unintended  starting-point  of  an 
idealization  of  humanity.  But  that  this  idealization 
has  ever  been  realized  in  history,  or  can  ever  be 
realized  in  a  human  life,  we  have  no  evidence.  The 
Virgin-birth  and  Santa  Claus,  the  Ascension  of  Christ 
and  the  ascent  of  Jack  the  Giant-killer,  are  equally 
idyllic  dreams  of  the  race's  childhood,  utterly  dis- 
carded since  it  has  reached  maturer  years.  Christianity 
is  a  matter  of  imagination;  it  is  poetry;  there  has 
been  no  incarnation  of  God,  and  no  redemption  by  the 
Cross. 

When  New  England  broke  away  from  evangelical 
theology,  no  real  theology  was  left  to  it,  and  its  gravi- 
tation was  downward.  The  high  Arianism  of  Chan- 
ning  gave  place  to  the  half-fledged  pantheism  of 
Parker ;  and  Parker's  faith  or  lack  of  faith  was  followed 
by  the  full-fledged  pantheism  of  Emerson.  More  and 
more  the  spirit  of  materialism  and  agnosticism  has 
taken  possession  of  the  Unitarian  body,  until  President 
Eliot  declares  that  other  religions  have  equal  claims 
with  Christianity,  and  that  Christian  missions  are  need- 
less and  absurd.  This  downward  progress  is  equally 
visible  in  literary  history.  The  Unitarian  poets  prove 
its  reality.  Longfellow  and  Lowell  succumbed  in  their 


A  THEOLOGICAL  DESCENSUS  AVERN1  345 

later  years  to  the  influence  of  Emerson,  and  became 
more  or  less  agnostic;  although,  as  Norton  observes, 
Lowell  tried  in  spite  of  himself  to  hold  to  his  old 
beliefs.  But  in  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  a  new  influ- 
ence was  added  to  the  general  literary  and  theological 
atmosphere  of  his  time,  namely,  that  of  modern  sci- 
entific research.  Holmes  was  a  physicist  and  a 
physician.  The  body  dominated  and  explained  the 
soul.  Spiritual  things  were  the  outcome  and  efflo- 
rescence of  the  material.  And  so  the  theology  of 
Holmes  is  practically  the  theology  of  Herbert 
Spencer. 

Congregationalists  furnish  still  another  illustration 
of  this  lapse  from  the  true  faith.  They  once  were  stout 
opposers  of  Unitarianism,  but  they  are  now  on  the 
same  road  to  skepticism.  In  "  The  Outlook,"  Lyman 
Abbott  is  asked  how  a  soul  seeking  after  God  is  to 
find  him.  The  answer  should  have  been  the  answer 
of  Christ :  "  He  that  hath  seen  me  hath  seen  the 
Father  " ;  "I  am  with  you  alway,  even  unto  the  end 
of  the  world  " ;  "I  will  come  to  you,  and  will  manifest 
myself  unto  you  " ;  "  Come  unto  me,  and  I  will  give 
you  rest"  In  other  words,  the  living  and  omnipresent 
Christ  is  God,  manifested  in  human  form,  as  the  ob- 
ject of  worship  and  source  of  power.  But  Doctor 
Abbott  apparently  sees  in  Christ  no  such  present  Sav- 
iour, for  he  does  not  point  the  sinner  to  Christ,  nor 
urge  him  to  address  Christ  in  prayer  for  forgiveness 
and  transformation.  In  other  writings  Doctor  Abbott 
asserts  his  "  faith  in  Jesus  Christ  as  a  giver  of  life 
by  his  presence  and  companionship  with  those  who 
love  him  and  desire  to  be  like  him."  But  can  we 


346  EVANGELICAL  FAITH  OR  AGNOSTICISM  ? 

rightfully  call  Christ's  presence  a  personal  presence, 
without  ourselves  addressing  him  and  sending  others 
directly  to  him  ?  However  Doctor  Abbott  may  answer 
this  question,  I  find  in  modern  Congregationalists  a 
tendency  to  look  upon  Christ  as  one  outside  of  us, 
while  Paul  regards  Christ  in  us  as  the  central  secret 
of  the  gospel.  He  is  the  Way,  the  Truth,  and  the  Life, 
only  by  proxy — only  by  being  the  beginner  of  these 
when  he  was  here  in  the  flesh.  Congregationalism  is 
at  the  parting  of  the  ways.  It  must  either  go  forward 
to  Unitarianism  and  agnosticism,  or  backward  to  the 
evangelical  faith  in  Christ's  deity,  omnipresence,  and 
living  union  with  the  believer.  This  is  the  essence 
of  Christianity,  and  to  give  it  up  is  to  give  up  Chris- 
tianity itself. 

I  have  kept  the  reader  too  long  from  the  poems  of 
Holmes  which  illustrate  these  criticisms.  I  find  even 
in  "  The  Chambered  Nautilus  "  the  traces  of  a  self- 
depending  spirit,  that  trusts  its  own  powers  in  the 
building  up  of  character.  There  is  no  intimation  that 
human  nature  needs  renewal,  or  even  assistance  from 
above.  No  confession  of  sin  is  breathed  upon  the  air. 
Regeneration  is  a  word  unknown.  No  suffering  on 
the  part  of  the  holy  God  is  needed  to  make  reparation 
for  sin,  or  to  show  the  sinner  the  evil  of  his  ways. 
No  divine  Redeemer  brings  him  back  to  duty.  Chris- 
tianity without  a  Christ  appears  yet  more  plainly  in  the 
hymns  which  our  poet  wrote  for  public  worship.  They 
are  hymns  of  praise  to  the  God  of  Nature,  and  their 
poetical  merit  has  gained  them  admission  to  the  books 
of  many  Christian  denominations.  But  they  could  be 
sung  as  well  by  Parsees  or  Buddhists.  In  the  best  of 


HYMNS    TO    THE    GOD    OF    NATURE  347 

them  there  is  a  mention  of  sin;  but  it  is  so  expressed 
as  to  imply  that  sin  is  something  outside  of  us,  which 
veils  heaven  from  our  gaze,  but  which  is  our  mis- 
fortune rather  than  our  fault: 

Lord  of  all  being!  throned  afar, 
Thy  glory  flames  from  sun  and  star; 
Centre  and  soul  of  every  sphere, 
Yet  to  each  loving  heart  how  near! 

Sun  of  our  life,  thy  quickening  ray 
Sheds  on  our  path  the  glow  of  day; 
Star  of  our  hope,  thy  softened  light 
Cheers  the  long  watches  of  the  night. 

Our  midnight  is  thy  smile  withdrawn; 
Our  noontide  is  thy  gracious  dawn; 
Our  rainbow  arch  thy  mercy's  sign; 
All,  save  the  clouds  of  sin,  are  thine! 

Lord  of  all  life,  below,  above, 

Whose  light  is  truth,  whose  warmth  is  love, 

Before  thine  ever-blazing  throne 

We  ask  no  lustre  of  our  own. 

Grant  us  thy  truth  to  make  us  free, 
And  kindling  hearts  that  burn  for  thee, 
Till  all  thy  living  altars  claim 
One  holy  light,  one  heavenly  flame! 

The  God  of  Nature  is  recognized  as  dwelling  also  in 
the  soul.  But  there  is  no  recognition  of  his  revelation 
in  Jesus  Christ,  or  of  the  need  of  any  such  revelation 
to  procure  pardon  or  help.  The  hymn  claims  favor 
without  sacrifice. 

Holmes  called  this  "  A  Sun-Day  Hymn,"  and  it  cer- 
tainly expresses  the  consciousness  of  fellowship  with 
God.  We  must  believe  that  the  poet's  inner  experi- 
ence was  better  than  his  creed.  Hyper-Calvinism  so 


348  "  HYMN    OF    TRUST  " 

repelled  him  that  he  gave  little  weight  to  the  evan- 
gelical argument,  and  little  weight  to  the  testimony  of 
Scripture  itself.  The  words  of  Jesus,  "  Ye  must  be 
born  again,"  never  seemed  to  him  applicable  to  him- 
self. Regeneration  was  not  needed  by  the  Brahmin 
caste,  any  more  than  by  Pharisees  like  Nicodemus. 
Or,  shall  we  say  that  he  was  regenerate,  without  know- 
ing it — subject  of  a  second  spiritual  birth  so  early  in 
life  as  to  have  lost  all  remembrance  of  the  change  ?  We 
must  leave  the  question  for  a  higher  Wisdom  to  decide. 
Meantime  we  may  appropriate  the  poetical  fruitage 
of  his  better  life,  as  it  is  given  to  us  in  his  "  Hymn  of 
Trust " : 

O  Love  Divine,  that  stooped  to  share 
Our  sharpest  pang,  our  bitterest  tear, 

On  Thee  we  cast  each  earth-born  care, 
We  smile  at  pain  while  Thou  art  near! 

Though  long  the  weary  way  we  tread, 
And  sorrow  crown  each  lingering  year, 

No  path  we  shun,  no  darkness  dread, 

Our  hearts  still  whispering,  Thou  art  near! 

When  drooping  pleasure  turns  to  grief, 
And  trembling  faith  is  changed  to  fear, 

The  murmuring  wind,  the  quivering  leaf, 
Shall  softly  tell  us,  Thou  art  near! 

On  Thee  we  fling  our  burdening  woe, 

O  Love  Divine,  forever  dear, 
Content  to  suffer  while  we  know, 

Living  and  dying,  Thou  art  near! 

Here  it  is  Nature,  and  not  revelation,  which  gives 
assurance  of  God's  nearness  and  willingness  to  bless. 
And  our  assent  is  yet  further  qualified,  when  we  find 
the  poet  excusing  sin  as  the  necessity  of  finiteness  and 


HOLMES*  S    MISAPPREHENSION    OF    CALVINISM    349 

ignorance,  as  he  does  in  his  poem  of  "  The  Crooked 
Footpath  " : 

Nay,  deem  not  thus, — no  earthborn  will 

Could  ever  trace  a  faultless  line; 
Our  truest  steps  are  human  still, — 

To  walk  unswerving  were  divine! 

Truants  from  love,  we  dream  of  wrath; — 

Oh,  rather  let  us  trust  the  more! 
Through  all  the  wanderings  of  the  path 

We  still  can  see  our  Father's  door! 

The  apostle  Paul  declares  that  "  the  wrath  of  God 
is  revealed  from  heaven  against  all  ungodliness  and 
unrighteousness  of  men."  Holmes,  however,  con- 
ceives that  we  only  "  dream  of  wrath,"  when  we  ought 
instead  to  "  trust  the  more."  This  suggests  a  third 
misapprehension  of  Calvinistic  doctrine  into  which  he 
has  fallen.  The  first,  we  remember,  was  that  Calvin- 
ism holds  men  responsible  for  the  sins  of  their  immedi- 
ate ancestors.  The  second  was  that  Calvinism  holds 
to  a  merely  physical  transmission  of  hereditary  evil. 
The  third  misapprehension,  which  we  now  proceed  to 
notice,  is  that  Calvinism  leaves  no  room  for  human 
freedom,  but  makes  our  destiny  depend  wholly  upon 
the  foreordination  of  God.  Calvin  himself,  however, 
declares  that  "  the  perdition  of  the  wicked  depends 
upon  the  divine  predestination  in  such  a  manner  that 
the  cause  and  matter  of  it  are  found  in  themselves  " ; 
in  other  words,  the  relation  of  God  to  the  origin  of  sin 
is  not  efficient,  but  permissive.  Calvin  held  to  the 
divine  sovereignty  and  foreordination,  for  the  reason 
that  the  creating  God  knew  all  that  would  come  to 
pass,  and  therefore  must  be  said  in  a  certain  sense  to 


35O  BITTERNESS    OF    HOLMES  S    PREJUDICE 

have  purposed  it.  But  he  also  asserted  the  freedom 
of  man  to  obey  or  to  disobey,  and  he  maintained 
that  for  the  abuse  of  his  freedom  man  alone  is  re- 
sponsible. While  all  are  involved  in  the  sin  of  the 
race,  the  atonement  is  made  for  all,  and  "  whosoever 
will  may  come."  God's  sovereignty  and  man's  freedom 
are  complementary  poles  of  the  globe  of  truth,  and 
while  it  is  impossible  to  see  both  of  them  at  the  same 
time,  neither  one  of  the  two  can  be  ignored  without 
violence  to  reason  as  well  as  to  Scripture.  In  thus 
vindicating  Calvin,  we  charge  Holmes  with  main- 
taining a  fatalistic  inheritance  of  physical  evil,  which 
deprives  it  of  all  moral  quality,  condones  our  con- 
scious sinfulness,  throws  the  blame  of  it  back  upon 
God,  and  so  denies  both  God's  holiness  and  his  love. 

How  bitter  and  prejudiced  Holmes  can  be,  when  he 
attacks  what  he  regards  as  Calvinistic  doctrine,  can 
be  seen  in  "  The  Poet  at  the  Breakfast  Table,"  who 
permits  himself  to  write: 

Where  is  the  Moloch  of  your  fathers'  creed, 

Whose  fires  of  torment  burned  for  span-long  babes? 

Fit  object  for  a  tender  mother's  love! 

Why  not?     It  was  a  bargain  duly  made 

For  these  same  infants  through  the  surety's  act 

Intrusted  with  their  all  for  earth  and  heaven, 

By  Him  who  chose  their  guardian,  knowing  well 

His  fitness  for  the  task, — this,  even  this, 

Was  the  true  doctrine  only  yesterday 

As  thoughts  are  reckoned, — and  to-day  you  hear 

In  words  that  sound  as  if  from  human  tongues 

Those  monstrous,  uncouth  horrors  of  the  past 

That  blot  the  blue  of  heaven  and  shame  the  earth 

As  would  the  saurians  of  the  age  of  slime, 

Awaking  from  their  stony  sepulchres 

And  wallowing  hateful  in  the  eye  of  day! 


HYPER-CALVINISM    AN    EXCUSE    FOR    HOLMES       351 

The  essay  on  "  Jonathan  Edwards"  is  also  a  notable 
specimen  of  our  poet's  theological  animus.  In  keen- 
ness of  satire  it  rivals  his  diatribe  on  "  Homoeopathy." 
Jonathan  Edwards  unfortunately  represents  hyper- 
Calvinism,  rather  than  Calvinism;  and  much  of  our 
poet's  criticism  is  unjust,  if  urged  against  the  essentials 
of  the  Calvinistic  system.  Holmes  shows  how  nearly 
he  liimself  comes  to  admitting  those  essentials,  when 
he  says : 

We  are  getting  to  be  predestinarians  as  much  as  Edwards 
or  Calvin  was;  only,  instead  of  universal  corruption  of  nature 
derived  from  Adam,  we  recognize  inherited  congenital  ten- 
dencies— some  good,  some  bad — for  which  the  subject  of  them 
is  in  no  sense  responsible. 

The  real  question  at  issue  is  whether  these  tendencies 
are  moral.  That  they  are  moral  seems  to  be  the  ver- 
dict of  conscience  and  of  Scripture.  That  verdict  is 
supported  by  our  conviction  of  the  solidarity  of  the 
race,  and  by  our  inability  otherwise  to  reconcile  the 
existence  of  these  tendencies  with  the  holiness  of  a 
foreknowing  and  creating  God.  Shall  we  say  that 
God  visits  suffering  and  death  upon  creatures  who  are 
without  fault?  Shall  we  not  rather  say  that  these 
evils  are  consequences  and  penalties  of  human  sin  ? 

We  would  not  deny  that  Holmes  had  some  excuse 
for  his  denunciations,  in  the  extravagancies  of  cer- 
tain hyper-Calvinists.  His  writing  has  perhaps  soft- 
ened the  utterances  of  Calvinistic  theologians.  But 
conscience  and  Scripture  stand  just  where  they  were 
before.  Calvinism  still  recognizes  the  guilt  of  race- 
sin  ;  while  at  the  same  time  it  acknowledges  that  actual 
sin,  in  which  the  personal  agent  reaffirms  the  under- 


352        ETHICAL    FRUITS   OF    HOLMES  S   DOCTRINE 

lying  determination  of  his  will,  is  more  guilty  than 
original  sin  alone;  that  no  human  being  is  finally  con- 
demned solely  on  account  of  original  sin,  but  that  all 
who,  like  infants,  do  not  commit  personal  transgres- 
sions, are  saved  through  the  application  of  Christ's 
atonement;  that  our  responsibility  for  inborn  evil  dis- 
positions, or  for  the  depravity  common  to  the  race, 
can  be  maintained  only  upon  the  ground  that  this  de- 
pravity was  caused  by  an  original  and  conscious  act  of 
free  will,  when  the  race  revolted  from  God  in  Adam; 
that  the  doctrine  of  original  sin  is  only  the  ethical  in- 
terpretation of  biological  facts — the  facts  of  heredity 
and  of  universal  congenital  ills,  which  demand  an 
ethical  ground  and  explanation;  and  that  the  idea  of 
original  sin  has  for  its  correlate  the  idea  of  original 
grace,  or  the  abiding  presence  and  operation  of  Christ, 
the  immanent  God,  in  every  member  of  -the  race,  in 
spite  of  his  sin,  to  counteract  the  evil  and  to  prepare 
the  way,  so  far  as  man  will  permit,  for  individual  and 
collective  salvation. 

Theology  must  be  judged  by  its  fruits.  A  theology 
that  objects  to  justice  as  the  fundamental  attribute 
of  God,  and  that  substitutes  love  for  righteousness, 
ought  to  be  more  than  usually  philanthropic.  I  do 
not  find  that  Holmes  gave  this  proof  that  his  faith 
was  well  founded.  He  was  an  industrious  and  trust- 
worthy lecturer  on  anatomy.  For  thirty-five  years 
literature  was  his  recreation,  until  at  last  he  was  able 
to  make  it  his  one  pursuit.  But  he  always  shrank  from 
the  reform  movements  of  his  time;  and,  except  by  his 
bright  conversation  and  jovial  humor,  he  did  next 
to  nothing  to  help  on  any  struggling  cause.  James 


HOLMES    TOUCHES    THE   SURFACE   OF  LIFE        353 

Russell  Lowell  wrote  him  a  most  serious  letter,  in 
which  he  complained  of  Holmes's  slighting  allusion  to 
"  the  abolition  men  and  maids,"  in  his  Phi  Beta  Kappa 
address,  and  intimated  that  he  would  "  expurgate  the 
conscience  altogether."  Holmes  made  a  long  and 
rather  weak  reply,  in  which  he  declared  that  abolition- 
ism was  not  his  line  of  work,  and  that  he  was  no  re- 
former. As  one  glances  over  the  welter  of  poems 
which  he  read  at  celebrations  and  public  dinners,  one 
is  reminded  of  the  lines  of  a  somewhat  similar  poet, 
Thomas  Moore: 

"  I  feel  like  one 

Who  treads  alone 
Some  banqtiet-hall  deserted, 

Whose  lights  are  fled, 

Whose  garlands  dead, 
And  all  but  he  departed!  " 

Society-verse  has  small  meaning  after  a  generation 
has  passed.  Holmes  had  little  depth  of  character, 
and  little  sense  of  duty  to  his  kind.  His  genius  was 
pleasure-loving  and  pleasure-giving,  and  beyond  the 
present  he  cared  not  to  look.  He  touched  only  the 
surface  of  human  life,  and  he  could  not  permanently 
stir  the  heart  or'  nerve  the  will.  The  homeopathic 
treatment  which  he  so  much  derided  in  medicine  he 
depended  upon  for  the  cure  of  the  constitutional 
malady  of  human  nature.  But  neither  esthetics  nor 
sociology  will  here  suffice.  Holmes's  work  was  like  the 
effort  to  kindle  a  coal-fire  from  the  top.  Christianity 
begins  lower  down ;  puts  its  fire  at  the  bottom ;  touches 
the  springs  of  action;  kindles  the  heart.  Holmes 
could  not  reach  any  great  depth  of  truth,  nor  could  he 


354  TO    CANAAN 

exert  any  great  force  of  influence,  because  he  ignored 
the  teaching  of  Scripture  with  regard  to  human  need. 
"  Deep  calleth  unto  deep  " — the  infinite  deep  of  man's 
sin  and  ruin  to  the  infinite  deep  of  God's  mercy.  Re- 
generation implies  a  sinful  nature,  inherited  yet  guilty ; 
and  such  a  nature  Holmes  derided  and  denied.  It  was 
the  old  story  of  the  Fox  and  the  Grapes.  The  grapes 
hung  altogether  too  high  for  his  short-legged  under- 
standing. 

Holmes  was  no  abolitionist.  He  connected  himself 
with  no  anti-slavery  societies.  He  could  not  forget  his 
relationship  to  a  patriarchal  Southern  planter,  who 
treated  his  slaves  as  fellow  beings,  and  attended  to 
their  religious  welfare.  Before  our  Civil  War,  Mrs. 
Stowe  and  he  had  some  correspondence  upon  the  sub- 
ject of  slavery,  but  Holmes  could  not  be  persuaded  to 
take  sides  in  the  controversy  which  agitated  the  nation. 
When  war  actually  broke  out,  however,  he  began  to 
realize  the  danger  of  disunion,  and  he  wrote  a  Puritan 
War-Song,  which  he  entitled  "  To  Canaan."  I  quote 
the  first  and  the  last  of  its  stanzas : 

Where  are  you  going,  soldiers, 

With  banner,  gun,  and  sword? 
We're  marching  South  to  Canaan 

To  battle  for  the  Lord! 
What  Captain  leads  your  armies 

Along  the  rebel  coasts? 
The  Mighty  One  of  Israel, 
His  name  is  Lord  of  Hosts! 
To  Canaan,  to  Canaan 
The  Lord  has  led  us  forth, 
To  blow  before  the  heathen  walls 
The  trumpets  of  the  North! 


"  NEVER  OR  NOW  "  355 

When  Canaan's  hosts  are  scattered, 

And  all  her  walls  lie  flat, 
What  follows  next  in  order? 
The  Lord  will  see  to  that! 
We'll  break  the  tyrant's  sceptre, — 

We'll  build  the  people's  throne, — 
When  half  the  world  is  Freedom's, 
Then  all  the  world's  our  own! 
To  Canaan,  to  Canaan 
The  Lord  has  led  us  forth, 
To  sweep  the  rebel  threshing-floors, 
A  whirlwind  from  the  North! 

In  1862,  his  song  "  Never  or  Now  "  appealed  to  young 
men  to  enlist  in  the  army  of  the  Union  : 

Listen,  young  heroes!  your  country  is  calling! 

Time  strikes  the  hour  for  the  brave  and  the  true! 
Now,  while  the  foremost  are  fighting  and  falling, 

Fill  up  the  ranks  that  have  opened  for  you! 

You  whom  the  fathers  made  free  and  defended, 
Stain  not  the  scroll  that  emblazons  their  fame! 

You  whose  fair  heritage  spotless  descended, 
Leave  not- your  children  a  birthright  of  shame! 

From  the  hot  plains  where  they  perish  outnumbered, 
Furrowed  and  ridged  by  the  battle-field's  plough, 

Comes  the  loud  summons;  too  long  you  have  slumbered, 
Hear  the  last  Angel-trump, — Never  or  Now! 

These  songs  were  not,  like  Luther's,  "  half-battles." 
It  was  said  that  "  he  wrote  war-lyrics  with  too  much 
finish  to  please;  they  were  over  the  heads  of  soldiers." 
He  was  more  felicitous  in  his  patriotic  hymns.  One 
of  these  he  wrote  for  the  great  central  Fair  in  Phila- 
delphia, in  1864;  another  after  the  Emancipation 
Proclamation,  in  1865.  This  last  witnesses  to  a  con- 
sciousness of  the  justice  of  God,  which  his  previous 


356  "  THOU    GOD   OF    VENGEANCE  " 

writings  had  not  shown,  and  which  was  perhaps 
awakened  by  the  terrible  carnage  of  our  battle-fields. 
His  journey  to  the  South  to  care  for  his  own  son,  who 
had  been  wounded  in  the  Federal  service,  was  possibly 
the  occasion  of  this  new  lesson  in  theology.  It  seems 
wonderful  that  Holmes  could  ever  have  put  into  a 
prayer  the  words,  "  Thou  God  of  vengeance !  "  But, 
in  those  days,  to  many  a  Quaker,  hell  began  to  seem 
a  military  necessity.  However  we  may  explain  the 
origin  of  the  hymn,  it  gives  us  the  most  satisfactory 
theological  utterance  of  our  poet : 

Giver  of  all  that  crowns  our  days, 
With  grateful  hearts  we  sing  thy  praise; 
Through  deep  and  desert  led  by  Thee, 
Our  promised  land  at  last  we  see. 

Ruler  of  Nations,  judge  our  cause! 
If  we  have  kept  thy  holy  laws, 
The  sons  of  Belial  curse  in  vain 
The  day  that  rends  the  captive's  chain. 

Thou  God  of  vengeance!     Israel's  Lord! 
Break  in  their  grasp  the  shield  and  sword, 
And  make  thy  righteous  judgments  known 
Till  all  thy  foes  are  overthrown! 

Then,  Father,  lay  thy  healing  hand 
In  mercy  on  our  stricken  land; 
Lead  all  its  wanderers  to  the  fold, 
And  be  their  Shepherd  as  of  old. 

So  shall  one  Nation's  song  ascend 
To  Thee,  our  Ruler,  Father,  Friend, 
While  Heaven's  wide  arch  resounds  again 
With  Peace  on  earth,  good-will  to  men! 

Holmes  was  as  far  from  being  a  transcendentalist  as 
he  was  from  being  an  abolitionist.     It  is  almost  amus- 


HOLMESS    "  LIFE   OF    EMERSON  35/ 

ing  that  he  should  have  been  selected  to  write  the 
"  Life  of  Emerson."  That  memoir  is  sketchy  and 
entertaining,  but  its  author  lacked  sympathy  with  its 
subject,  and  had  little  knowledge  of  his  philosophy. 
In  fact,  the  tendency  of  his  thought  was  in  quite  the 
opposite  direction  from  that  of  Emerson.  Holmes's 
biographer  says  truly  that  "  he  found  it  easier  to  get 
at  the  cranial  bones  and  the  brain-cells  than  at  thoughts 
and  mental  processes."  Emerson  was  fundamentally 
an  idealist,  while  Holmes  was  fundamentally  a  ma- 
terialist. Neither  one  of  them  was  a  philosopher,  in 
the  sense  of  having  a  consistent  and  completed  system. 
The  result,  in  Holmes's  "  Life  of  Emerson,"  is  a  bril- 
liant but  superficial  survey  of  his  subject,  without  per- 
ception of  its  deeper  relations  to  literature  or  to  life. 
The  intercourse  of  the  two  men  had  never  been  fre- 
quent or  intimate.  They  understood  one  another, 
only  as  occasional  guests  at  the  same  table  learn  of 
their  companions  from  the  talk  of  the  dinner.  They 
agreed  in  their  deterministic  creed,  and  in  their  aversion 
to  organized  societies  for  reform.  But  they  were  far 
apart  in  their  conceptions  of  the  universe :  Holmes  was 
more  of  a  theist ;  Emerson  more  of  a  pantheist.  Holmes 
had  more  of  fancy,  Emerson  more  of  imagination. 
The  New  England  conscience  was  still  alive  in  Holmes, 
while  intellect  was  the  main  characteristic  of  Emerson. 
Yet  Holmes  has  done  us  good  service  in  perpetuat- 
ing the  memory  of  Emerson's  personal  traits  and  pe- 
culiarities. It  almost  seems  as  if  Emerson's  lofty 
idealism  had  smitten  Holmes  with  inquiring  but  hope- 
less awe.  In  the  Introduction  to  "  A  Mortal  Antip- 
athy," Holmes  writes  of  Emerson: 


358  HOLMES'S    "  MEMOIR    OF    MOTLEY  " 

It  is  a  great  privilege  to  have  lived  so  long  in  the  society  of 
such  a  man.  "He  nothing  common"  said,  "or  mean."  He 
was  always  the  same  pure  and  high-souled  companion.  After 
being  with  him,  virtue  seemed  as  natural  to  man  as  its  oppo- 
site did  accoiding  to  the  old  theologies.  But  how  to  let  one's 
self  down  from  the  high  level  of  such  a  character  to  one's 
own  poor  standard?  I  trust  that  the  influence  of  this  long 
intellectual  and  spiritual  companionship  never  absolutely 
leaves  one  who  has  lived  in  it.  It  may  come  to  him  in  the 
form  of  self-reproach  that  he  falls  so  far  short  of  the  superior 
being  who  has  been  so  long  the  object  of  his  contemplation. 

"  This  long  intellectual  and  spiritual  companion- 
ship," it  must  be  remembered,  was  a  companionship 
with  Emerson's  books  and  relics  after  Emerson's  death. 
Holmes  was  the  recipient  of  a  posthumous  influence 
from  Emerson's  writings  far  greater  than  any  which 
he  received  while  Emerson  was  alive.  One  other 
biography  was  written  with  more  intimate  knowl- 
edge— I  mean  Holmes's  "  Memoir  of  Motley."  John 
Lothrop  Motley  was  for  years  a  trusted  correspondent 
of  Holmes — not  even  Lowell  was  so  much  his  con- 
fidant. Our  poet  indeed  was  not  a  great  letter-writer ; 
but  upon  Holmes  both  Lowell  and  Motley,  during  their 
diplomatic  service  abroad,  depended  for  information 
with  regard  to  society  and  politics  at  home.  Holmes's 
letters  show  much  sagacity,  in  spite  of  the  narrow 
round  of  his  occupations.  The  "  Memoir  of  Motley  " 
lacks  the  breadth  of  view  which  foreign  life  and  travel 
would  have  given,  but  it  is  a  praiseworthy  effort  to 
make  known  the  merits  of  a  friend  who  had  suffered 
unjust  reproach.  No  other  work  of  Holmes  reveals 
so  fully  the  sympathy  of  his  heart,  as  do  the  letters 
he  wrote  to  Motley  upon  the  death  of  his  wife.  I 
quote  from  them  only  a  few  sentences : 


HOLMES  S    TRIBUTES    TO    HIS    FRIENDS  359 

My  dear  Motley, — I  read  your  letter  with  feelings  I  could 
not  restrain — how  could  I  read  such  a  letter  unmoved?  .  . 
Every  word  you  say  goes  to  my  heart  as  to  that  of  a  friend 
who  knows  better  than  most  can  know  what  she  was  who 
was  the  life  of  your  life.  .  .  I  dare  not  attempt  to  console  a 
grief  like  yours.  .  .  If  you  were  here,  I  might  sit  by  you  in 
silence,  just  to  give  you  the  feeling  that  some  one  was  with 
you  in  the  shadow  for  the  moment.  .  .  We  never  know  each 
other  until  we  have  come  together  in  the  hour  of  trial.  .  .  I 
cannot  tell  you  all  that  I  feel  I  owe  to  you  for  making  life 
more  real,  more  sincere,  more  profound  in  its  significance, 
during  those  hours  I  spent  with  you.  To  be  told,  as  I  have 
been,  that  they  were  comforting  to  you  is  a  great  happiness 
to  me.  .  .  My  life  has  run  in  a  deeper  channel  since  the  hours 
I  spent  in  your  society  last  summer.  They  come  back  to  me 
from  time  to  time,  like  visitations  from  another  and  higher 
sphere.  No, — I  never  felt  the  depths  and  the  heights  of  sor- 
row so  before;  and  I  count  it  as  a  rare  privilege  that  I  could 
be  with  you  so  often  at  one  of  those  periods  when  the  sharp- 
est impressions  are  taken  from  the  seal  of  friendship. 

Holmes  did  not  write  many  memorial  verses;  the 
elegiac  and  the  funereal  were  not  natural  to  him.  But 
now  and  then  the  beauty  of  a  life  that  had  just  passed 
from  earth  so  challenged  his  admiration  that  he  could 
not  resist  the  impulse  to  commemorate  it.  He  lived  to 
see  many  noble  friends  precede  him  to  their  burial. 
He  wrote  poems  or  hymns  in  memory  of  Everett, 
Garfield,  Sumner,  Howe,  Peirce,  Andrew,  Parkman, 
Whittier,  Longfellow,  and  Lowell.  But  his  best  pro- 
ductions were  those  of  welcome  or  farewell  to  living 
men  of  note,  delivered  at  public  dinners  in  their  honor. 
Such  were  the  tributes  given  to  Peabody,  Hedge,  Gould, 
Collins,  Clarke,  Agassiz,  Farragut,  Hayes,  and  Grant. 
Each  of  these  memorials  is  noteworthy  for  its  subtle 
delineation  of  character,  or  for  its  revelation  of  the 
poet's  geniality  and  sympathy.  In  my  selection  of 


360  "  A    FAREWELL   TO    AGASSIZ  " 

specimen  verses  I  must  confine  myself  to  three,  and 
first  of  all  must  quote  the  poet's  "  Parting  Health  "  to 
Motley,  upon  his  return  to  England  in  1857,  after  his 
publication  of  the  "  History  of  the  Dutch  Republic  " : 

Yes,  we  knew  we  must  lose  him, — though  friendship  may 

claim 

To  blend  her  green  leaves  with  the  laurels  of  fame; 
Though  fondly,  at  parting,  we  call  him  our  own, 
'Tis  the  whisper  of  love  when  the  bugle  has  blown. 

So  fill  a  bright  cup  with  the  sunlight  that  gushed 
When  the  dead  summer's  jewels  were  trampled  and  crushed; 
THE  TRUE  KNIGHT  OF  LEARNING, — the  world  holds  him  dear, — 
Love  bless  him,  Joy  crown  him,  God  speed  his  career! 

In  1865,  Holmes  wrote  "  A  Farewell  to  Agassiz," 
on  the  eve  of  the  great  naturalist's  journey  to  Brazil : 

How  the  mountains  talked  .together, 

Looking  down  upon  the  weather, 

When  they  heard  our  friend  had  planned  his 

Little  trip  among  the  Andes! 

How  they'll  bare  their  snowy  scalps 

To  the  climber  of  the  Alps 

When  the  cry  goes  through  their  passes, 

"  Here  comes  the  great  Agassiz!  " 

"  Yes,  I'm  tall,"  says  Chimborazo, 

"  But  I  wait  for  him  to  say  so, — 

That's  the  only  thing  that  lacks, — he 

Must  see  me,  Cotopaxi!  " 

Till  the  fossil  echoes  roar; 
While  the  mighty  megalosaurus 
Leads  the  palaeozoic  chorus, — 
God  bless  the  great  Professor, 
And  the  land  his  proud  possessor, — 
Bless  them  now  and  evermore! 


POEMS   TO    HARRIET    BEECHER   STOWE  361 

And  on  the  seventieth  birthday  of  Harriet  Beecher 
Stowe,  in  1882,  Holmes  addressed  to  her  two  poems. 
The  first  was  entitled  "  At  the  Summit,"  and  it  began : 

Sister,  we  bid  you  welcome, — we  who  stand 

On  the  high  table-land; 

We  who  have  climbed  life's  slippery  Alpine  slope, 
And  rest,  still  leaning  on  the  staff  of  hope, 
Looking  along  the  silent  Mer  de  Glace, 
Leading  our  footsteps  where  the  dark  crevasse 
Yawns  in  the  frozen  sea  we  all  must  pass, — 

Sister,  we  clasp  your  hand! 

The  second  of  these  poems  is  named  "  The  World's 
Homage."  Its  first  lines  are: 

If  every  tongue  that  speaks  her  praise 
For  whom  I  shape  my  tinkling  phrase 

Were  summoned  to  the  table, 
The  vocal  chorus  that  would  meet 
Of  mingling  accents  harsh  or  sweet, 
From  every  land  and  tribe,  would  beat 

The  polyglots  at  Babel. 


And  the  last  stanza  is  the  following: 

When  Truth  herself  was  Slavery's  slave, 
Thy  hand  the  prisoned  suppliant  gave 

The  rainbow  wings  of  fiction. 
And  Truth  who  soared  descends  to-day 
Bearing  an  angel's  wreath  away, 
Its  lilies  at  thy  feet  to  lay 

With  Heaven's  own  benediction. 

Holmes  well  knew  how  fleeting  was  the  significance 
of  poems  such  as  these.  "  You  understand,"  he  said, 
"  the  difference  between  fireworks  on  the  evening  of 
July  Fourth,  and  the  look  of  the  frames  the  next  morn- 
ing." He  was  content  to  give  even  temporary  pleasure. 

7, 


362  HOLMES    A    POET    OF    THIS    LIFE 

Let  me  not  be  understood  as  depreciating  his  peculiar 
gift.  He  was  an  entertainer,  rather  than  a  teacher.  He 
added  to  the  gaiety  of  life.  He  cheered  and  comforted, 
lightened  care,  diverted  the  sorrowing.  His  was  the 
ministry  of  humor.  Shall  we  say  that  our  chief  po- 
etical humorist  has  no  proper  place  in  the  great  singing 
choir  ?  Rather  let  us  be  thankful  that  poetry  is  so  wide 
a  realm  that  it  can  include  innocent  mirth.  John  Mil- 
ton was  a  serious  poet,  yet  he  wrote : 

"  Haste  thee,  Nymph,  and  bring  with  thee 
Jest,  and  youthful  Jollity, 
Quips,  and  Cranks,  and  wanton  Wiles, 
Nods,  and  Becks,  and  wreathed  Smiles, 
Such  as  hang  on  Hebe's  cheek, 
And  love  to  live  in  dimples  sleek; 
Sport,  that  wrinkled  Care  derides, 
And  Laughter  holding  both  his  sides." 

Holmes  was  a  chronic  protest  against  the  narrow- 
ness of  Puritan  religion.  True  religion  aims  to 
possess  and  to  develop  the  whole  man,  to  stimulate 
and  ennoble  all  his  powers,  to  bring  these  powers  to 
full  flower  and  expression.  The  one  defect  of  Shake- 
speare is  not  his  consecration  of  humor,  but  his  neglect 
of  the  spiritual  element  in  man.  The  defect  in  Holmes 
is  not  his  effervescent  humor,  but  his  ignorance  of 
spiritual  realities,  and  his  consequent  overvaluation  of 
the  seen  and  temporal.  To  this  was  added  a  positive 
fault  of  which  Shakespeare  was  not  guilty,  namely,  an 
attack  upon  the  teaching  of  Scripture  and  the  settled 
beliefs  of  the  Christian  church.  Like  Shakespeare, 
he  was  a  poet  of  this  life,  but  not  of  the  life  to  come. 
We  turn  to  him  in  vain  for  words  that  will  give  hope 


HOLMES'S    HUMOR    FRESH    IN    HIS    AGE  363 

to  the  conscious  sinner,  or  assurance  to  the  dying. 
He  lived  a  long  life,  and  died  at  the  age  of  eighty-five. 
Deafness  interfered  with  his  social  enjoyments,  but  an 
abstemious  diet  and  regular  habits  of  sleep  and  exer- 
cise made  him  industrious  to  the  end.  His  "  Hun- 
dred Days  in  Europe  "  is  the  spicy  record  of  a  con- 
tinuous ovation  abroad,  during  which  he  was  honored 
with  the  highest  degrees  of  the  British  universities, 
and  was  made  the  lion  of  London  society.  At  Cam- 
bridge, the  undergraduates  saluted  with  the  song, 
"  Holmes,  sweet  Holmes  " ;  and  at  Oxford  a  student 
cried  out,  "  Did  you  come  in  your  One-Hoss-Shay  "  ? 
This  English  tour  was  his  only  period  of  travel  since 
his  first  stay  abroad  fifty-three  years  before.  But  to  all 
observers  he  seemed  as  fresh  and  sparkling  as  in  the 
days  of  his  youth.  Some  of  his  latest  poems  indeed 
give  proof  that  his  humor  was  an  endowment  that 
age  could  not  stale  or  wither. 

I  cannot  complete  this  picture  of  the  poet  without 
furnishing  evidence  that  this  last  statement  is  'true. 
Let  me  quote  from  a  few  of  Holmes's  last  produc- 
tions to  prove  my  point.  The  poem  entitled  "  The 
Broomstick  Train ;  or,  The  Return  of  the  Witches," 
commemorates  the  terrible  witchcraft  delusion  of 
1692: 

Look  out!    Look  out,  boys!     Clear  the  track! 
The  witches  are  here!    They've  all  come  back! 
They  hanged  them  high, — No  use!     No  use! 
What  cares  a  witch  for  a  hangman's  noose? 
They  buried  them  deep,  but  they  wouldn't  lie  still, 
For  cats  and  witches  are  hard  .to  kill; 
They  swore  they  should  n't  and  would  n't  die, — 
Books  said  they  did,  but  they  lie!  they  lie! 


364  "  THE    BROOMSTICK    TRAIN  " 

A  couple  of  hundred  years  or  so, 

They  had  knocked  about  in  the  world  below, 

When  an  Essex  Deacon  dropped  in  to  call, 

And  a  homesick  feeling  seized  them  all; 

For  he  came  from  a  place  they  knew  full  well, 

And  many  a  tale  he  had  to  tell. 

They  longed  to  visit  the  haunts  of  men, 

To  see  the  old  dwellings  they  knew  again, 

And  ride  on  their  broomsticks  all  around 

Their  wide  domain  of  unhallowed  ground. 

The  poet  humorously  sees  the  witches  now  at  work  in 
the  modern  motor-car,  with  its  mysterious  motion 
without  mule  or  horse : 

Since  then  on  many  a  car  you  '11  see 

A  broomstick  plain  as  plain  can  be; 

On  every  stick  there  's  a  witch  astride, — 

The  string  you  see  to  her  leg  is  tied. 

She  will  do  a  mischief  if  she  can, 

But  the  string  is  held  by  a  careful  man, 

And  whenever  the  evil-minded  witch 

Would  cut  some  caper,  he  gives  a  twitch. 

As  for  the  hag,  you  can't  see  her, 

But  hark!  you  can  hear  her  black  cat's  purr, 

And  now  and  then,  as  a  car  goes  by, 

You  may  catch  a  gleam  from  her  wicked  eye. 

Often  you've  looked  on  a  rushing  train, 

But  just  what  moved  it  was  not  so  plain. 

It  couldn't  be  those  wires  above, 

For  they  could  neither  pull  nor  shove; 

Where  was  the  motor  that  made  it  go 

You  could  n't  guess,  but  now  you  know. 

Remember  my  rhymes  when  you  ride  again 
On  the  rattling  rail  by  the  broomstick  train! 

"  Grandmother's  Story  of  Bunker  Hill  Battle " 
might  almost  persuade  us  that  Holmes  was  himself  a 
looker-on  at  that  famous  fight : 


"  STORY  OF  BUNKER  HILL  BATTLE  "      365 

'  Tis  like  stirring  living  embers  when,  at  eighty,  one  remembers 
All  the  achings  and  the  quakings  of  "  the  times  that  tried 

men's  souls  "; 

When  I  talk  of  Whig  and  Tory,  when  I  tell  the  Rebel  story, 
To  you  the  words  are  ashes,  but  to  me  they're  burning  coals. 

Grandmother  had  nursed  a  young  Continental  soldier 
who  had  been  wounded  in  the  battle : 

For  they  all  thought  he  was  dying,  as  they  gathered  round 

him  crying, — • 
And  they  said,  "  Oh,  how  they'll  miss  him!  "  and,  "  What  will 

his  mother  do?  " 
Then,  his  eyelids  just  unclosing  like  a  child's  that  has  been 

dozing, 
He  faintly  murmured,  "Mother!" — and — I  saw  his  eyes  were 

blue. 

"  Why,  grandma,  how  you're  winking!  "    Ah,  my  child,  it  sets 

me  thinking 

Of  a  story  not  like  this  one.    Well,  he  somehow  lived  along; 
So  we  came  to  know  each  other,  and  I  nursed  him  like  a — 

mother, 
Till  at  last  he  stood  before  me,  tall,  and  rosy-cheeked,  and 

strong. 

And  we  sometimes  walked  together  in  the  pleasant  summer 

weather, — 
"Please  to  tell  us  what  his  name  was?"    Just  your  own,  my 

little  dear, — 
There's  his  picture  Copley  painted:  we  became  so  well 

acquainted, 
That — in  short,  that's  why  I'm  grandma,  and  you  children  all 

are  here. 

"  How  the  Old  Horse  won  the  Bet  "  is  the  story  of  a 
parson's  "  lean  and  bony  bay  "  which,  "  lent  to  the  sex- 
ton "  to  attend  an  alleged  funeral,  surprised  the  crowd 
at  the  race-track : 


366  "  THE    IRON    GATE  " 

The  parson's  horse  had  won  the  bet; 
It  cost  him  something  of  a  sweat; 
Back  in  the  one-horse  shay  he  went; 
The  parson  wondered  what  it  meant, 
And  murmured,  with  a  mild  surprise 
And  pleasant  twinkle  of  the  eyes, 
"  That  funeral  must  have  been  a  trick, 
Or  corpses  drive  at  double-quick; 
I  should  n't  wonder,  I  declare, 
If  brother — Jehu— made  the  prayer!  " 

And  this  is  all  I  have  to  say 
About  that  tough  old  trotting  bay, 
Huddup!    Huddup!    G'lang!    Good  day! 

Moral  for  which  this  tale  is  told: 
A  horse  can  trot,  for  all  he's  old. 

At  the  breakfast  given  in  honor  of  Doctor  Holmes's 
seventieth  birthday  by  the  publishers  of  "  The  Atlantic 
Monthly,"  in  1879,  he  read  his  poem  "  The  Iron  Gate." 
It  so  well  represents  the  spirit  of  his  closing  years, 
that  I  reproduce  some  fragments  of  it : 

Where  is  this  patriarch  you  are  kindly  greeting? 

Not  unfamiliar  to  my  ear  his  name, 
Nor  yet  unknown  to  many  a  joyous  meeting 

In  days  long  vanished, — is  he  still  the  same? 

Or  changed  by  years,  forgotten  and  forgetting, 
Dull-eared,  dim-sighted,  slow  of  speech  and  thought, 

Still  o'er  the  sad,  degenerate  present  fretting, 
Where  all  goes  wrong,  and  nothing  as  it  ought? 


Youth  longs  and  manhood  strives,  but  age  remembers, 
Sits  by  the  raked-up  ashes  of  the  past, 

Spreads  its  thin  hands  above  the  whitening  embers 
That  warm  its  creeping  life-blood  till  the  last. 


LOWELL    "  TO    HOLMES  "  367 

Dear  to  its  heart  is  every  loving  token 
That  comes  unbidden  ere  its  pulse  grows  cold, 

Ere  the  last  lingering  ties  of  life  are  broken, 
Its  labors  ended  and  its  story  told. 


Time  claims  his  tribute:  silence  now  is  golden; 

Let  me  not  vex  the  too  long  suffering  lyre; 
Though  to  your  love  untiring  still  beholden, 

The  curfew  tells  me — cover  up  the  fire. 

And  now  with  grateful  smile  and  accents  cheerful, 
And  warmer  heart  than  look  or  word  can  tell, 

In  simplest  phrase — these  traitorous  eyes  are  tearful — 
Thanks,  Brothers,  Sisters,— Children,— and  farewell! 

And  on  his  seventy-fifth  birthday,  in  1884,  Lowell 
inscribed  "  To  Holmes  "  some  verses  which  may  well 
serve  for  a  final  characterization  of  the  poet  and  the 
man: 

"  Dear  Wendell,  why  need  count  the  years 
Since  first  your  genius  made  me  thrill, 
If  what  moved  then  to  smiles  or  tears, 
Or  both  contending,  move  me  still? 

"  What  has  the  Calendar  to  do 

With  poets?    What  Time's  fruitless  tooth 
With  gay  immortals  such  as  you 

Whose  years  but  emphasize  your  youth? 


Master  alike  in  speech  and  song 
Of  fame's  great  antiseptic — Style, 

You  with  the  classic  few  belong 
Who  tempered  wisdom  with  a  smile. 

Outlive  us  all!  Who  else  like  you 
Could  sift  the  seedcorn  from  our  chaff, 

And  make  us  with  the  pen  we  knew 
Deathless  at  least  in  epitaph?" 


VIII 
SIDNEY  LANIER 


SIDNEY  LANIER 


POETRY  and  Music  have  always  been  a  wedded  pair. 
Both  are  forms  of  imaginative  expression,  though 
poetry  is  the  more  intellectual,  and  music  the  more 
emotional.  It  is  claimed  by  some  that  music  is  the 
original  and  fundamental  reality.  The  word  "  Muse  " 
seems  to  favor  that  contention.  Certain  it  is  that 
children  and  childlike  peoples  strive  to  put  their  feel- 
ings into  melodic  form,  even  before  they  can  give 
them  words.  With  growing  maturity  there  comes 
more  definite  thought.  Emotion  becomes  conscious. 
Ideas,  in  turn,  blossom  into  song.  "  Maxwelton  Braes 
Are  Bonnie "  and  "  The  Marseillaise  Hymn "  are 
poetry  so  full  of  emotion  that  nothing  but  music  can 
give  it  utterance.  Music  thus  becomes  the  handmaid 
and  helper  of  poetry.  Rhythm  and  melody,  however, 
react  upon  the  thought  that  called  them  forth.  The 
servant  sometimes  gives  law  to  the  master,  and  the 
rules  of  musical  art  stifle  spontaneity  of  invention.  If 
poetry  is  to  be  truly  great,  it  must  insist  upon  inde- 
pendence. Inspiration  must  make  its  own  rules.  The 
melodist  must  not  impose  his  rhythm  too  inexorably 
upon  the  poet;  while  at  the  same  time  the  poet  must 
never  lose  sight  of  his  need  of  musical  expression.  He 
may  use  discords,  but  it  must  always  be  with  a  view  to 
a  larger  harmony. 

Sidney  Lanier  was  primarily  a  musician,  and  sec- 

371 


372  OUR    CHIEF    POETICAL    MUSICIAN 

ondarily  a  poet.  He  is  the  only  one  of  our  American 
poets  who  was  master  of  a  musical  instrument,  and 
who  also  evolved  a  complete  theory  of  the  structure  of 
poetry.  While  as  a  poet  he  had  originality  and  depth 
of  emotion,  his  musical  tastes  and  thoughts  tended 
to  dominate  his  poetical  composition,  and  to  make  it 
too  rigid  and  mechanical.  With  great  sensitiveness 
of  organization  he  united  an  extraordinary  and  even 
a  heroic  devotion  to  principle.  To  be  true  to  his  con- 
victions with  regard  to  art  and  life,  he  was  ready  to 
make  the  greatest  sacrifices.  His  history  furnishes  us 
with  an  illustration  of  conscious  surrender  to  duty, 
both  in  the  esthetic  and  in  the  moral  realms.  And 
yet,  in  his  efforts  to  subject  poetry  to  the  trammels  of 
a  system,  his  musical  instincts  lorded  it  over  his  genius, 
and  prevented  his  most  complete  poetical  development. 
We  must  therefore  call  him  our  chief  poetical  musician 
rather  than  our  chief  musical  poet. 

The  life  of  Lanier  was  brief  and  pathetic.  Born 
in  1842,  he  died  in  1881.  But  Keats  lived  to  be  only 
twenty-six,  and  Shelley  to  be  only  thirty,  while  Lanier 
died  at  thirty-nine.  Poe  died  at  forty.  There  are 
curious  resemblances  between  Lanier  and  Poe,  and 
even  more  instructive  differences.  They  are  our  two 
Southern  poets,  both  of  them  breathing  the  emotion 
and  the  passion  of  the  South.  But  Poe's  English 
schooling  emancipated  him  completely  from  Southern 
ideals  and  traditions.  In  only  one  of  his  tales  does 
he  show  any  acquaintance  with  Negro  character  or 
dialect;  and  as  for  slavery,  it  is  as  if  he  had  never 
known  of  its  existence;  he  thought  all  reformers  in- 
deed to  be  madmen;  he  was  as  complete  a  cosmo- 


LANIER   AND    POE  373 

politan  as  if  he  had  always  lived  in  Great  Britain. 
Lanier,  on  the  other  hand,  was  in  spirit  bound  up 
with  the  South;  he  practically  gave  his  life  to  the 
Confederate  cause;  though  misguided,  he  was  a  true 
patriot;  some  of  his  most  effective  poems  are  in  the 
Negro  dialect;  he  sympathized  with  many  forms  of 
labor  and  reform.  Poe's  conception  of  poetry  was 
exclusively  emotional;  to  him  poetry  was  only  music, 
designed  to  stir  the  feelings  with  the  vague  sense 
of  beauty,  but  with  no  intent  to  influence  the  will. 
Lanier  was  equally  an  artist,  but  with  truth  at  the 
basis  of  his  art ;  he  aimed  to  make  beauty  an  inspira- 
tion to  noble  and  heroic  action;  he  said,  "  The  trouble 
with  Poe  was,  he  did  not  know  enough."  In  short, 
while  Poe  was  a  poetical  melodist,  Lanier  was  more; 
he  was  a  poetical  musician,  whose  intellectual  appre- 
hension of  rhythm  and  number  brought  mere  emo- 
tion into  subjection,  and  made  it  the  instrument  of 
truth  and  duty. 

Materials  for  the  life  of  Lanier  are  not  abundant. 
The  memorial  by  William  Hayes  Ward  prefixed  to 
the  standard  edition  of  Lanier's  "  Poems,"  and  the 
biography  of  Lanier  by  Edwin  Mims  in  "  American 
Men  of  Letters,"  are  our  best  sources  of  information. 
The  former,  though  succinct,  is  remarkably  compre- 
hensive and  sympathetic.  The  latter  fills  in  the  outline 
with  valuable  details,  drawn  from  Lanier's  letters  and 
the  reports  of  his  friends,  while  it  adds  much  in  the 
way  of  critical  estimate.  From  both  these  sources  we 
learn  that  our  poet  was  the  son  of  Robert  S.  Lanier, 
a  reputable  lawyer  of  Macon,  Georgia,  and  of  Mary 
J.  Anderson,  a  Virginia  lady  of  Scotch-Irish  descent. 


374  LANIERS    PASSION    FOR    MUSIC 

The  father  carne  of  Huguenot  ancestry,  and  on  both 
sides  of  the  family  there  were  far  back  in  the  line 
both  gentle  blood  and  artistic  gifts.  Sidney,  from  a 
child,  had  a  passion  for  music.  He  played  all  sorts 
of  instruments — piano,  organ,  violin,  guitar,  banjo, 
flute — almost  by  instinct,  and  was  often  so  carried 
away  by  harmony  as  to  be  lifted  into  a  trancelike  rap- 
ture. His  father  feared  the  influence  of  the  violin 
upon  him ;  its  human  quality  was  too  engrossing ;  for 
it  was  substituted  the  flute,  which  the  boy  played  with 
a  spirituality  of  expression  exceedingly  unique  and 
penetrating.  In  after  days,  as  first  flute  in  the  Pea- 
body  Symphony  Orchestra  at  Baltimore,  he  never 
lacked  for  support  or  admiration. 

Lanier's  flute  and  Lanier  himself  were  so  inseparable 
that  they  will  go  down  into  history,  and  we  must 
give  a  moment  to  tracing  the  connection  between  them. 
The  first  instrument  of  the  sort  which  he  possessed 
was  of  his  own  manufacture.  When  he  was  only 
seven  years  old,  he  cut  a  reed  from  the  river-bank, 
stopped  its  ends  with  cork,  and  dug  six  finger-holes 
in  its  sides.  On  this  he  would  practise  passionately, 
going  into  the  woods  to  imitate  bird-trills,  and  lead- 
ing an  orchestra  of  his  playmates.  All  through  his 
college  days  the  flute  was  his  recreation,  and  through 
his  army  life  its  companionship  helped  him  to  endure 
hardship  and  suffering.  Natural  facility,  however, 
did  not  blind  him  to  the  need  of  technical  skill.  He 
made  himself  master  of  his  art  by  unending  study. 
His  beautiful  silver  flute  became  a  central  point  of 
interest  in  every  concert.  The  director  of  the  Pea- 
body  Orchestra  writes  of  him : 


LANIER  S    EDUCATIONAL    BEGINNINGS  375 

"  His  playing  appealed  alike  to  the  musically  learned  and  to 
the  unlearned — for  he  would  magnetize  the  listener;  but  the 
artist  felt  in  his  performance  the  superiority  of  the  momentary 
living  inspiration  to  all  the  rules  and  shifts  of  mere  technical 
scholarship.  His  art  was  not  only  the  art  of  art,  but  an  art 
above  art.  I  will  never  forget  the  impression  he  made  upon 
me  when  he  played  the  flute  concerto  of  Emil  Hartmann  at  a 
Peabody  Symphony  concert  in  1878, — his  tall,  handsome, 
manly  presence;  his  flute  breathing  noble  sorrows,  noble  joys; 
the  orchestra  softly  responding.  The  audience  was  spell- 
bound. Such  distinction,  such  refinement!  He  stood,  the 
master,  the  genius!  " 

I  have  sketched  thus  briefly  Lanier's  musical  de- 
velopment, not  only  because  it  enables  us  better  to 
understand  the  peculiarities  of  his  poetry,  but  also  be- 
cause it  long  preceded  his  recognition  of  poetry  as 
the  all-inclusive  art,  and  his  consequent  determination 
to  make  it  the  object  of  his  supreme  devotion.  It 
was  not  until  he  had  reached  the  age  of  thirty-two 
that  this  change  became  complete.  How  gradual 
was  the  poetical  development,  can  only  be  real- 
ized when  we  go  back  to  his  educational  beginnings, 
and  trace  from  those  beginnings  the  growth  of  his 
mind  and  heart.  In  his  father's  house  he  had  received 
the  liberal  culture  which  was  furnished  by  a  well- 
stocked  library,  and  by  traditions  of  Southern  hos- 
pitality. Nearly  six  feet  in  height,  and  of  dignified 
but  winning  manners,  he  was  known  by  all  as  a  typical 
Southern  gentleman.  When  only  fourteen  he  entered 
Oglethorpe  College,  and  at  eighteen  he  was  graduated 
at  the  head  of  his  class.  After  his  graduation  he  was 
tutor  in  the  college,  and  this  position  he  held  until  the 
outbreak  of  our  Civil  War.  With  all  his  musical 
gifts,  he  shared  the  opinion  of  his  parents  that  music 


376    LANIER'S  STRUGGLES  TO  LEARN  HIS  DUTY 

was  not  a  worthy  profession  for  life.  Yet  he  felt 
that  music  was  his  chief  endowment.  The  result  was 
a  struggle  to  learn  the  way  of  duty — a  struggle  which 
could  be  decided  only  by  a  larger  knowledge  of  litera- 
ture and  of  life.  Not  until  fourteen  years  after,  when 
poetry  had  risen  before  him  as  the  'highest  work  of 
human  imagination,  did  he  determine  to  give  him- 
self to  poetry,  and  to  make  his  musical  gifts  minister 
to  a  higher  and  broader  poetical  art. 

His  nature  was  religious,  but  he  was  conscious  of 
genius,  and  he  desired  to  make  the  most  of  his  talents. 
When  he  was  a  college  boy  of  eighteen,  he  wrote  in 
a  penciled  note-book  the  following  significant  words : 

The  point  which  I  wish  to  settle  is  merely,  by  what  method 
shall  I  ascertain  what  I  am  fit  for,  as  preliminary  to  ascer- 
taining God's  will  with  reference  to  me;  or  what  my  inclina- 
tions are,  as  preliminary  to  ascertaining  what  my  capacities 
are,  that  is,  what  I  am  fit  for.  I  am  more  than  all  perplexed  by 
this  fact,  that  the  prime  inclination,  that  is,  natural  bent 
(which  I  have  checked,  though)  of  my  nature  is  to  music; 
and  for  that  I  have  the  greatest  talent;  indeed,  not  boasting, 
for  God  gave  it  me,  I  have  an  extraordinary  musical  talent, 
and  feel  it  within  me  plainly  that  I  could  rise  as  high  as  any 
composer.  But  I  cannot  bring  myself  to  believe  that  I  was 
intended  for  a  musician,  because  it  seems  so  small  a  business 
in  comparison  with  other  things  which,  it  seems  to  me,  I 
might  do.  Question  here,  What  is  the  province  of  music  in 
the  economy  of  the  world? 

Here  are  great  questions  suggested.  That  they  oc- 
curred to  him  thus  early  is  proof  of  a  thoughtful  and 
serious  mind.  He  never  forgot  the  Calvinistic  and 
Presbyterian  training  he  had  received  in  Macon, 
though  exuberant  spirits  and  wider  knowledge  modi- 
fied his  practice.  Long  afterward  he  wrote : 


INFLUENCE    OF  JAMES    VVOODROW    ON    LANIER   3/7 

If  the  constituents  and  guardians  of  my  childhood — those 
good  Presbyterians  who  believed  me  a  model  for  the  Sunday- 
school  children  of  all  times — could  have  witnessed  my  acts 
and  doings  this  day,  I  know  not  what  groans  of  sorrowful 
regret  would  arise  in  my  behalf. 

But  how  intensely  conscientious  he  was  during  his 
college  life  may  be  judged  from  a  letter  of  penitence 
written  to  his  father,  when  on  one  occasion  he  had 
broken  his  father's  rule  never  to  borrow  money  from 
a  college  mate : 

My  father,  I  have  sinned.  With  what  intensity  of  thought, 
with  what  deep  and  earnest  reflection,  have  I  contemplated 
this  lately!  My  heart  throbs  with  the  intensity  of  its  anguish. 
.  .  If  by  hard  study  and  good  conduct  I  can  atone  for  that, 
God  in  heaven  knows  that  I  shall  not  be  found  wanting.  .  . 
Not  a  night  passes  but  what  the  supplication,  God  bless  my 
parents,  ascends  to  the  great  mercy-seat. 

It  was  an  orthodox  college  which  Lanier  attended. 
But  James  Woodrow  was  its  Professor  of  Science. 
He  was  a  pupil  of  Agassiz,  and  he  had  studied  in 
Germany.  He  maintained  that  science  is  a  revelation 
from  God,  and  he  accepted  the  doctrine  of  evolu- 
tion. For  this  he  was  ultimately  tried  and  condemned 
by  the  Southern  Presbyterian  Church.  He  made 
Lanier  a  frequent  companion,  and  after  his  gradua- 
tion secured  for  him  the  tutorship.  Woodrow  never 
gave  up  his  Christian  faith,  but  rather  held  that  science 
confirmed  it.  His  influence  on  Lanier  was  powerful. 
It  enabled  our  poet  to  realize  that  nature  and  art, 
genius  and  religion,  are  not  powers  hostile  to  each 
other,  but  that  each  represents  an  aspect  of  God's 
truth  which  must  have  its  place  and  influence  in 

2A 


37^  LANIER   A   SOUTHERN    VOLUNTEER 

human  life.  He  became  an  independent  thinker,  while 
at  the  same  time  he  remained  a  genuinely  religious 
man.  The  old  conflict  between  musical  taste  and 
ethical  demands  was  reconciled,  since  both  had  a  divine 
origin.  He  learned  the  supremacy  of  reason  over 
emotion,  of  thought  over  melody.  He  sought  to  reen- 
force  his  thought-life  by  science  and  literature,  and 
so  to  fit  himself  for  the  largest  possible  service.  He 
planned  to  study  in  Europe,  as  Longfellow  had  already 
done.  Poetry  was  to  be  enriched  by  all  his  gifts  of 
music,  scholarship,  and  travel.  We  wonder  what  the 
result  would  have  been  if  he  had  been  permitted  to 
carry  out  his  plan.  With  sadness  we  must  record,  in- 
stead, a  long  period  of  arrested  development.  War 
had  sounded  his  brazen  trumpet,  and  Lanier's  con- 
science bade  him  stand  for  the  South. 

The  story  of  his  valor  and  suffering  in  our  Civil 
War  is  a  thrilling  though  sorrowful  one.  He  had 
the  boyish  love  for  military  life.  He  had  led  mimic 
battalions  of  his  schoolfellows.  When  Southern  youth 
were  summoned,  as  the  proclamations  ran,  to  defend 
their  institutions  against  the  despotism  and  fanaticism 
of  the  North,  every  college  closed  its  doors  and  sent 
its  students  to  the  front.  Lanier  was  only  nineteen, 
a  stripling,  but  a  model  of  health  and  energy.  With 
his  brother  Clifford,  still  younger  than  himself,  he 
enlisted  as  a  private  in  the  Macon  Volunteers,  the 
first  company  that  went  to  Virginia  from  Georgia. 
Three  times,  it  is  reported,  he  refused  promotion,  in 
order  that  he  might  be  near  his  brother  and  care  for 
him.  During  the  first  year,  encamped  near  Norfolk, 
he  saw  the  attractive  side  of  army  life,  the  pomp  and 


LANIER  S    HEALTH    BROKEN    BY    ARMY    LIFE      379 

circumstance  of  war.  The  proximity  of  the  prosper- 
ous city  gave  him  congenial  society.  There  was  op- 
portunity for  reading  and  for  music,  and  Lanier's 
flute  made  him  in  constant  request.  The  daily  drilling 
of  raw  recruits  was  followed  by  nightly  dances  and 
serenades.  The  second  year  of  his  service  saw  his 
company  mounted  as  scouts  on  good  horses,  and  pa- 
trolling the  banks  of  the  James.  But  war  now  began 
to  reveal  its  horrors.  Lanier  was  engaged  in  the 
battles  of  Seven  Pines  and  of  Drewry's  Bluffs.  He 
went  through  the  seven  days  of  fighting  about  Rich- 
mond, which  culminated  at  Malvern  Hill.  Exposure 
gave  him  his  first  premonitions  of  consumption.  But 
a  two-weeks'  visit  on  furlough  to  his  home  in  Macon 
made  life  bright  again,  for  there  he  met  and  became 
engaged  to  Miss  Mary  Day,  whom  four  years  after- 
ward he  married,  and  who  proved  to  be  the  guardian 
angel  of  his  life. 

Both  he  and  his  brother  served  in  the  army  for 
three  years,  but  during  the  last  of  the  three  they  were 
separated,  though  only  that  each  might,  as  signal-of- 
ficer, take  charge  of  a  blockade-runner  which  brought 
rebel  supplies.  On  one  of  these  expeditions,  only 
fourteen  hours  after  leaving  harbor,  he  was  captured, 
and  for  four  months  was  confined  in  Point  Lookout 
prison.  His  already  weakened  constitution  never  out- 
grew the  shock  of  that  imprisonment.  To  it  he  at- 
tributed the  permanent  loss  of  his  health.  In  the 
biography  by  Mims,  we  are  told  that  he  secured  his 
release  through  some  gold  which  a  friend  of  his  had 
smuggled  into  the  prison  in  his  mouth.  "  He  came 
out  emaciated  to  a  skeleton,  downhearted  for  want 


380  LANIER'S  DESPERATE  ILLNESS 

of  news  from  home,  downhearted  for  weariness." 
Mims  quotes  from  Baskervill  the  story  of  his  rescue 
from  death,  as  told  by  the  lady  herself,  who  was  the 
good  Samaritan  on  this  occasion: 

"  She  was  an  old  friend  from  Montgomery,  Alabama,  re- 
turning from  New  York  to  Richmond;  and  her  little  daughter, 
who  had  learned  to  call  him  Brother  Sid,  chanced  to  hear  that 
he  was  down  in  the  hold  of  the  vessel  dying.  On  application 
to  the  colonel  in  command,  permission  was  promptly  given  her 
to  minister  to  his  necessity,  and  she  made  haste  to  go  below. 
'  Now  my  friends  in  New  York,'  continued  she,  '  had  given 
me  a  supply  of  medicines,  for  we  had  few  such  things  in 
Dixie,  and  among  the  remedies  were  quinine  and  brandy.  I 
hastily  took  a  flask  of  brandy,  and  we  went  below,  where  we 
were  led  to  the  rude  stalls  provided  for  cattle,  but  now 
crowded  with  poor  human  wretches.  There  in  that  horrible 
place  dear  Sidney  Lanier  lay  wrapt  in  an  old  quilt,  his  thin 
hands  tightly  clinched,  his  face  drawn  and  pinched,  his  eyes 
fixed  and  staring,  his  poor  body  shivering  now  and  then  in  a 
spasm  of  pain.  Lilla  fell  at  his  side,  kissing  him  and  calling: 
"  Brother  Sid,  don't  you  know  me?  Don't  you  know  your 
little  sister?"  But  no  recognition  or  response  came  from  the 
sunken  eyes.  I  poured  some  brandy  into  a  spoon  and  gave  it 
to  him.  It  gurgled  down  his  throat  at  first  with  no  effort 
from  him  to  swallow  it.  I  repeated  the  stimulant  several 
times  before  he  finally  revived.  At  last  he  turned  his  eyes 
slowly  about  until  he  saw  Lilla,  and  murmured:  "Am  I  dead? 
Is  this  Lilla?  Is  this  heaven?"  .  .  To  make  a  long  story 
short,  the  colonel  assisted  us  to  get  him  above  to  our  cabin. 
I  can  see  his  fellow  prisoners  now  as  they  crouched  and 
assisted  to  pass  him  along  over  their  heads,  for  they  were  so 
packed  that  they  could  not  make  room  to  carry  him  through. 
Along  over  their  heads  they  tenderly  passed  the  poor  emaci- 
ated body,  so  shrunken  with  prison  life  and  benumbed  with 
cold.  We  got  him  into  clean  blankets,  but  at  first  he  could 
not  endure  the  pain  from  the  fire,  he  was  so  nearly  frozen. 
We  gave  him  some  hot  soup  and  more  brandy,  and  he  lay 
quiet  till  after  midnight.  Then  he  asked  for  his  flute  and 
began  playing.  As  he  played  the  first  few  notes,  you  should 


DAWN    OF   POETICAL   AMBITION  381 

have  heard  the  yell  of  joy  that  came  up  from  the  shivering 
wretches  down  below,  who  knew  that  their  comrade  was  alive. 
And  there  we  sat  entranced  about  him,  the  colonel  and  his 
wife,  Lilla  and  I,  weeping  at  the  tender  music,  as  the  tones 
of  new  warmth  and  color  and  hope  came  like  liquid  melody 
from  his  magic  flute.' " 

His  release  from  Point  Lookout  occurred  in  Feb- 
ruary, 1865.  Within  a  few  weeks  the  Confederacy 
was  at  an  end,  and  Lanier,  with  only  his  twenty-dollar 
gold-piece  and  his  flute,  walked  all  the  way  from  Rich- 
mond to  his  home  in  Georgia.  Six  weeks  of  desperate 
illness  followed,  and  not  long  after  his  recovery  his 
beloved  mother  died  of  consumption.  He  was  by 
turns  a  clerk  and  a  schoolmaster  for  three  years,  and 
during  these  years  he  married.  Then  came  his  first 
hemorrhage,  settled  cough,  and  steady  decline.  But 
out  of  these  troubled  days  he  emerged  with  a  new 
sense  of  his  vocation.  Though  for  several  years  he 
strove  to  make  both  ends  meet,  by  studying  and  prac- 
tising law  with  his  father,  it  gradually  dawned  upon 
him  that  literature  was  his  real  calling.  Indeed,  when 
death  most  threatened  him,  he  became  most  conscious 
of  genius  and  most  determined  to  fight  for  life.  So 
early  as  1864,  in  a  letter  to  his  father,  he  wrote: 

Gradually  I  find  that  my  whole  soul  is  merging  itself  into 
this  business  of  writing,  and  especially  of  writing  poetry.  I 
am  going  to  try  it;  and  am  going  to  test,  in  the  most  rigid 
way  I  know,  the  awful  question  whether  it  is  my  vocation. 

If  this  was  his  ambition  in  the  very  stress  and  strain 
of  his  war  experiences,  it  is  not  wonderful  that  the 
law  practice  of  a  country  attorney  did  not  satisfy  him. 
In  1873  he  wrote  from  Texas  to  his  wife: 


382       LANIER'S  CONFESSION  OF  HIS  CALLING 

Were  it  not  for  some  circumstances  which  make  such  a 
proposition  seem  absurd  in  the  highest  degree,  I  should  think 
that  I  am  shortly  to  die,  and  that  my  spirit  hath  been  singing 
its  swan-song  before  dissolution.  All  day  my  soul  hath  been 
cutting  swiftly  into  the  great  space  of  the  subtle,  unspeakable 
deep,  driven  by  wind  after  wind  of  heavenly  melody. 

And  in  another  letter  to  his  wife  he  makes  frank 
confession  of  his  faith  in  himself  and  in  his  calling: 

Know,  then,  that  disappointments  were  inevitable,  and  will 
still  come,  until  I  have  fought  the  battle  which  every  great 
artist  has  had  to  fight  since  the  world  began.  This — dimly 
felt  while  I  was  doubtful  of  my  own  vocation  and  powers — is 
clear  to  me  as  the  sun,  now  that  I  know,  through  the  fiercest 
tests  of  life,  that  I  am  in  soul,  and  shall  be  in  life  and  utter- 
ance, a  great  poet. 

All  this  might  seem  but  the  dream  of  an  overwrought 
imagination,  if  it  were  not  for  the  religious  faith  in 
which  it  is  grounded,  and  the  humble  sense  of  his 
dependence  upon  God.  Let  us  read  some  later  words 
of  this  same  letter : 

Now  this  is  written  because  I  sit  here  in  my  room  daily,  and 
picture  thee  picturing  me  worn,  and  troubled,  or  disheartened; 
and  because  I  do  not  wish  thee  to  think  up  any  groundless 
sorrow  in  thy  soul.  Of  course  I  have  my  keen  sorrows,  mo- 
mentarily more  keen  than  I  would  like  any  one  to  know; 
but  I  thank  God  that  in  a  knowledge  of  Him  and  of  myself 
which  cometh  to  me  daily  in  fresh  revelations,  I  have  a  stead- 
fast firmament  of  blue,  in  which  all  clouds  soon  dissolve. 

The  utter  collapse  of  the  Confederacy  and  the  ruin 
of  the  South,  added  to  his  own  ill  health,  gave  a 
somber  tone  to  his  earliest  poetry.  He  was  naturally 
cheerful,  yet  there  seemed  to  hang  over  his  spirit 
the  premonition  of  future  sorrow.  He  refused  to 


LANIER'S  LOVE-POEMS  383 

print  his  first  poems,  for  the  very  reason  that  their 
sadness  of  tone  was  not  consistent  with  the  highest 
art.  In  this  he  was  the  opposite  of  Poe,  who  welcomed 
and  echoed  the  most  doleful  voices  of  humanity,  pro- 
vided they  were  moving  and  melodious.  We  find  in 
Lanier's  early  works  a  sweetness  and  maturity  which 
more  than  make  up  for  their  occasional  mournful- 
ness.  His  love-poems  belong  mostly  to  this  period, 
and  they  are  addressed  to  his  wife.  There  is  a  dainti- 
ness of  touch  in  his  "  Song  for  the  Jacquerie,"  which 
gives  promise  of  the  future: 

May  the  maiden, 

Violet-laden 
Out  of  the  violet  sea, 

Comes  and  hovers 

Over  lovers, 
Over  thee,  Marie,  and  me, 

Over  me  and  thee. 

Day  the  stately, 

Sunken  lately 
Into  the  violet  sea, 

Backward  hovers 

Over  lovers, 
Over  thee,  Marie,  and  me, 

Over  me  and  thee. 

Night  the  holy, 

Sailing  slowly 
Over  the  violet  sea, 

Stars  uncovers 

Over  lovers, 
Stars  for  thee,  Marie,  and  me, 

Stars  for  me  and  thee. 

"  My  Springs,"  written  long  after,  when  struggle  and 
sorrow  had  given  new  sacredness  to  their  affection, 


384  "  THE    JACQUERIE  " 

must  be  quoted  to  show  how  nobly  ripened  was  the 
expression  of  that  affection  in  his  poetry: 

In  the  heart  of  the  Hills  of  Life,  I  know 
Two  springs  that  with  unbroken  flow 
Forever  pour  their  lucent  streams 
Into  my  soul's  far  Lake  of  Dreams. 


O  Love,  O  Wife,  thine  eyes  are  they, 

— My  springs  from  out  whose  shining  gray 

Issue  the  sweet  celestial  streams 

That  feed  my  life's  bright  Lake  of  Dreams. 


Dear  eyes,  dear  eyes  and  rare  complete — 
Being  heavenly-sweet  and  earthly-sweet, 
— I  marvel  that  God  made  you  mine, 
For  when  He  frowns,  'tis  then  ye  shine! 

"  The  Jacquerie,"  the  longest  of  his  poems,  is  also 
one  of  his  earliest.  Its  subject  is  the  uprising  of  the 
French  peasantry  against  feudal  oppression  in  the  mid- 
dle of  the  fourteenth  century.  Lanier's  readings  of 
history  in  college  drew  his  attention  to  this  theme, 
and  enlisted  his  sympathy  with  the  poor  and  down- 
trodden. He  sought  to  glorify  in  verse  the  advent  of 
Trade,  which  first  set  limits  to  the  domination  of  the 
nobles;  and  then  sought  equally  to  glorify  the  advent 
of  Brotherhood,  which  now  promises  to  restrict  the 
aggressions  of  Trade.  His  plan  was  too  large,  and 
it  required  too  much  of  learning,  to  reach  comple- 
tion. "  The  Jacquerie  "  always  remained  "  A  Frag- 
ment." But  it  contains  some  dignified  and  impressive 
stanzas,  and  it  shows  rare  powers  not  yet  under  per- 
fect control.  Its  opening  lines  are  a  poetical  descrip- 


"  RESURRECTION  "  385 

tion  of  that  great  popular  outbreak  which  began  so 
hopefully,  but  which  came  to  so  speedy  and  so  fear- 
ful an  end  : 

Once  on  a  time,  a  Dawn,  all  red  and  bright 
Leapt  on  the  conquered  ramparts  of  the  Night, 
And  flamed,  one  brilliant  instant,  on  the  world, 
Then  back  into  the  historic  moat  was  hurled 
And  Night  was  King  again,  for  many  years. 
— Once  on  a  time  the  Rose  of  Spring  blushed  out 
But  Winter  angrily  withdrew  it  back 
Into  his  rough  new-bursten  husk,  and  shut 
The  stern  husk-leaves,  and  hid  it  many  years. 

Even  in  this  poem  the  dominant  note  is  not  that  of 
sadness,  but  of  joy.  And  in  his  whole  poetic  develop- 
ment the  element  of  joy  became  more  and  more  pro- 
nounced as  he  went  on.  His  Calvinistic  training  was 
in  a  measure  outgrown,  but  faith  in  a  divine  ordering 
of  human  life  and  destiny  remained,  the  change  being 
only  in  the  new  emphasis  given  to  God's  love.  In  the 
first  poems,  pain  and  death  are  more  plain  to  view; 
in  the  last,  He  who  conquered  pain  and  death.  In 
proof  of  this,  let  us  set  in  juxtaposition  two  poems, 
one  from  the  beginning  of  his  career,  and  the  other 
from  the  end.  The  first  is  "  Resurrection  "  : 

Sometimes  in  morning  sunlights  by  the  river 
Where  in  the  early  fall  long  grasses  wave, 

Light  winds  from  over  the  moorland  sink  and  shiver 
And  sigh  as  if  just  blown  across  a  grave. 

And  then  I  pause  and  listen  to  this  sighing. 

I  look  with  strange  eyes  on  the  well-known  stream. 
I  hear  wild  birth-cries  uttered  by  the  dying. 

I  know  men  waking  who  appear  to  dream. 


386   "A  BALLAD  OF  TREES  AND  THE  MASTER" 

Then  from  the  water-lilies  slow  uprises 
The  still  vast  face  of  all  the  life  I  know, 

Changed  now,  and  full  of  wonders  and  surprises, 
With  fire  in  eyes  that  once  were  glazed  with  snow. 


For  eighteen  centuries  ripple  down  the  river, 

And  windy  times  the  stalks  of  empires  wave, 
— Let  the  winds  come  from  the  moor  and  sigh  and 

shiver, 
Fain,  fain  am  I,  O  Christ,  to  pass  the  grave. 

Here  seems  to  be  a  vision  of  Him  who  is  "  the  Resurv 
rection  and  the  Life,"  and  who  has  brought  "  life  and 
immortality  to  light"  Compare  with  this  the  poem 
next  to  the  last  Lanier  wrote — a  poem,  in  our  judgment 
inimitably  expressing  the  method  by  which  that  "  life 
and  immortality  "  were  won,  namely,  by  our  Lord's 
loving  surrender  to  death,  "  for  the  joy  that  was  set 
before  Him."  It  is  "A  Ballad  of  Trees  and  the 
Master": 

Into  the  woods  my  Master  went, 

Clean  forspent,  forspent. 

Into  the  woods  my  Master  came, 

Forspent  with  love  and  shame. 

But  the  olives  they  were  not  blind  to  Him, 

The  little  gray  leaves  were  kind  to  Him: 

The  thorn-tree  had  a  mind  to  Him 

When  into  the  woods  He  came. 

Out  of  the  woods  my  Master  went, 

And  He  was  well  content. 

Out  of  the  woods  my  Master  came, 

Content  with  death  and  shame. 

When  Death  and  Shame  would  woo  Him  last, 

From  under  the  trees  they  drew  Him  last: 

Twas  on  a  tree  they  slew  Him — last 

When  out  of  the  woods  He  came. 


LANIER  A  LECTURER  ON   LITERATURE  387 

It  was  not  until  December,  1873,  that  Lanier  ob- 
tained employment  sufficiently  steady  to  support  his 
growing  family  and  to  permit  any  regular  devotion 
to  literary  work.  At  that  time  his  great  musical 
talent  secured  for  him  a  permanent  position  in  the 
Peabody  Symphony  Orchestra  of  Baltimore.  With 
this  encouragement  he  felt  that  he  must  put  forth 
every  energy  of  his  being  to  do  his  work  while  strength 
remained.  Then  began  a  heroic  fight  with  death — 
a  fight  which  lasted  for  eight  long  years,  and  in  which 
the  frail  body  at  last  succumbed.  He  was  cheered  by 
being  appointed  Lecturer  on  English  Literature  in  the 
Peabody  Institute  in  1878,  and  in  the  Johns  Hopkins 
University  in  1879.  But  these  encouragements  came 
late,  when  he  was  greatly  weakened.  His  lectures 
seemed  like  the  struggles  of  an  indomitable  spirit  to 
resist  a  tide  that  was  bearing  him  to  another  shore. 
His  courses  on  Shakespeare  and  on  the  English 
Novel  were  admired.  They  revealed  rare  powers  of 
criticism  and  an  unexpected  wealth  of  learning.  In 
truth,  the  access  to  great  libraries  and  to  cultivated 
society  had  stimulated  him  to  omnivorous  reading,  and 
had  given  his  faculties  a  wonderfully  rapid  growth. 
The  world  had  come  to  believe  in  him  as  the  rising 
poet  of  the  South,  and  the  atmosphere  of  praise,  after 
long  depression,  was  grateful  and  quickening. 

It  was  his  poem  entitled  "  Corn  "  that  first  brought 
his  poetry  into  public  notice.  After  his  first  winter's 
work  as  musician  in  Baltimore  he  spent  the  summer 
near  his  old  home.  The  waving  fields  of  corn  which 
alternated  with  deserted  farms  stirred  the  fountains 
of  poetry  within  him.  He  saw  in  the  multiplication 


388  "  CORN  " 

of  homesteads,  and  the  cultivation  of  the  soil  by  free 
labor,  the  restoration  of  prosperity  in  the  South. 
Manufactures  had  not  yet  impressed  their  claims  upon 
him.  The  beauty  of  the  woods  and  of  all  natural 
growths  seemed  to  him  God's  appeal  to  man  to  till 
the  soil.  So  in  this  poem  we  have  the  contrast  be- 
tween desolation  and  fertility,  and  the  prophecy  of 
harvests  yet  to  come : 

To-day  the  woods  are  trembling  through  and  through 
With  shimmering  forms,  that  flash  before  my  view, 
Then  melt  in  green  as  dawn-stars  melt  in  blue. 

The  leaves  that  wave  against  my  cheek  caress 
Like  women's  hands;  the  embracing  boughs  express 

A  subtlety  of  mighty  tenderness; 
The  copse-depths  into  little  noises  start, 
That  sound  anon  like  beatings  of  a  heart, 
Anon  like  talk  'twixt  lips  not  far  apart. 

He  sees  all  this  promise  turned  to  naught  by  unthrift 
and  avarice,  yet  believes  in  the  better  future  which 
industry  may  insure : 

Yet  shall  the  great  God  turn  thy  fate, 

And  bring  thee  back  into  thy  monarch  state 

And  majesty  immaculate. 

Lo,  through  hot  waverings  of  the  August  morn, 
Thou  givest  from  thy  vasty  sides  forlorn 
Visions  of  golden  treasuries  of  corn — 
Ripe  largesse  lingering  for  some  bolder  heart 
That  manfully  shall  take  thy  part, 
And  tend  thee, 
And  defend  thee, 
With  antique  sinew  and  with  modern  art. 

The  publication  of  "  Corn  "  in  "  Lippincott's  Maga- 
zine "  made  many  friends  for  the  poet.    To  one  of  these 


"  THE    SYMPHONY  "  389 

friends,  Mr.  Peacock,  he  wrote,  in  1875,  of  another 
poem,  based  upon  the  same  idea  that  agriculture  was 
the  hope  of  the  South — not  the  agriculture  of  great 
plantations,  but  of  innumerable  farms  tilled  by  free- 
men. As  in  his  earlier  poem  of  "  Jacquerie,"  with  a 
still  lingering  prejudice  against  workmen  and  fac- 
tories, he  regards  Trade  as  stifling  individual  develop- 
ment, and  welcomes  the  new  Brotherhood  of  labor. 
Of  this  new  poem  he  writes: 

I  call  it  "The  Symphony":  I  personify  each  instrument  in 
the  orchestra,  and  make  them  discuss  various  deep  social 
questions  of  the  times,  in  the  progress  of  the  music.  It  is 
now  nearly  finished;  and  I  shall  be  rejoiced  thereat,  for  it 
verily  racks  all  the  bones  of  my  spirit. 

The  program  was  a  bold  one ;  whether  it  was  wise  to 
make  musical  instruments  actually  speak,  may  well  be 
doubted.  The  poet's  skill  in  executing  his  scheme, 
however,  was  considerable,  as  may  be  seen  from  the 
following  quotations : 

"O  Trade!     O  Trade!  would  thou  wert  dead! 
The  Time  needs  heart — 'tis  tired  of  head: 
We're  all  for  love,"  the  violins  said. 


But  presently 

A  velvet  flute-note  fell  down  pleasantly 
Upon  the  bosom  of  that  harmony, 
And  sailed  and  sailed  incessantly, 
As  if  a  petal  from  a  wild-rose  blown 
Had  fluttered  down  upon  that  pool  of  tone. 


Yea,  Nature,  singing  sweet  and  lone, 
Breathes  through  life's  strident  polyphone 
The  flute-voice  in  the  world  of  tone, 


39°      LANIER  S    CANTATA    FOR    THE    CENTENNIAL 

Sweet  friends, 

Man's  love  ascends 
To  finer  and  diviner  ends 
Than  man's  mere  thought  e'er  comprehends. 

And  then  the  hautboy  played  and  smiled, 
And  sang  like  any  large-eyed  child, 
Cool-hearted  and  all  undented. 

"Huge  Trade!"  he  said, 
"  Would  thou  wouldst  lift  me  on  thy  head 
And  run  where'er  my  finger  led! 
Once  said  a  Man — and  wise  was  He — 
Never  shalt  thou  the  heavens  see, 
Save  as  a  little  child  thou  be." 

"And  yet  shall  Love  himself  be  heard, 
Though  long  deferred,  though  long  deferred: 
O'er  the  modern  waste  a  dove  hath  whirred: 
Music  is  Love  in  search  of  a  word." 

This  poem,  when  published  in  "  Lippincott's  Maga- 
zine," won  the  praise  of  Bayard  Taylor,  and  led, 
through  his  recommendation,  to  the  choice  of  Lanier 
to  compose  the  Cantata  for  the  Opening  of  the  Cen- 
tennial World's  Fair  at  Philadelphia,  in  1876.  Our 
poet  merited  his  appointment,  for  he  represented  the 
reconstructed  South,  and  the  new  consciousness  of 
our  national  unity.  The  days  of  bitterness  had  passed  ; 
slavery  was  no  more;  let  the  blue  and  the  gray  clasp 
hands  and  vow  fidelity  to  the  Union.  It  was  a  large 
task  to  put  all  this  into  song.  Lanier's  conception 
of  his  work  was  that  of  Pindar's  Odes.  His  Cantata 
was  not  a  poem,  to  be  read ;  it  was  a  song,  to  be  sung, 
and  sung  by  a  thousand  voices,  with  majestic  or- 
chestral accompaniment.  Judged  simply  as  a  poem, 
it  seems  flighty  and  hysterical  It  was  received  by 


LANIER  S    CANTATA    FOR   THE    CENTENNIAL      39! 

the  press  with  ridicule.  But  when  actually  rendered, 
it  proved  to  be  the  one  and  only  part  of  the  program 
that  completely  held  the  attention  and  won  the  applause 
of  the  vast  audience.  We  cannot  deny  the  startling 
energy  and  poetic  insight  of  the  following  passages: 

From  this  hundred-terraced  height, 
Sight  more  large  with  nobler  light 
Ranges  down  yon  towering  years. 
Humbler  smiles  and  lordlier  tears 

Shine  and  fall,  shine  and  fall, 
While  old  voices  rise  and  call 
Yonder  where  the  to-and-fro 
Weltering  of  my  Long-Ago 
Moves  about  the  moveless  base 
Far  below  my  resting-place. 

This  opening  stanza  is  accompanied  by  the  following 
Musical  Annotations :  "  Full  chorus,  sober,  measured 
and  yet  majestic  progressions  of  chords."  Then  comes 
a  second  "  Chorus :  the  sea  and  the  winds  mingling 
their  voices  with  human  sighs  " : 

Mayflower,  Mayflower,  slowly  hither  flying, 
Trembling  westward  o'er  yon  balking  sea, 
Hearts  within  Farewell  dear  England  sighing, 
Winds  without  But  dear  in  -vain  replying, 
Gray-lipp'd  waves  about  thee  shouted,  crying 
"No!     It  shall  not  be!" 

After  a  musical  representation  of  the  famine  and 
savagery  of  Jamestown,  and  an  allusion  to  the  "  wild 
brother-wars "  from  which  our  country  had  just 
emerged,  comes  a  "  Chorus  of  jubilation  " : 

Now  Praise  to  God's  oft-granted  grace, 
Now  Praise  to  man's  undaunted  face, 
Despite  the  land,  despite  the  sea, 


392  DEFECTS   AND    HANDICAP    OF  LANIER 

I  was:  I  am:  and  I  shall  be — 

How  long,  Good  Angel,  O  how  long? 

Sing  me  from  Heaven  a  man's  own  song! 

And  in  a  "  basso  solo  "  the  Good  Angel  replies  to  this 
importunity : 

"  Long  as  thine  Art  shall  love  true  love, 
Long  as  thy  Science  truth  shall  know, 
Long  as  thine  Eagle  harms  no  Dove, 
Long  as  thy  Law  by  law  shall  grow, 
Long  as  thy  God  is  God  above, 
Thy  brother  every  man  below, 
So  long,  dear  Land  of  all  my  love, 
Thy  name  shall  shine,  thy  fame  shall  glow!" 

Our  national  Centennial  fairly  launched  our  poet  in 
his  literary  career.  Music  now  became  the  servant  of 
poetry.  He  had  won  his  way  to  public  notice.  He 
had  given  promise  of  great  achievements.  While  suc- 
cess made  him  more  sure  of  his  vocation,  it  also  gave 
him  a  new  sense  of  his  defects  as  a  writer.  So  early 
as  1864,  indeed,  he  had  written  to  his  father: 

I  have  frequently  noticed  in  myself  a  tendency  to  a  diffuse 
style;  a  disposition  to  push  my  metaphors  too  far,  employ- 
ing a  multitude  of  words  to  heighten  the  patness  of  the  image, 
and  so  making  of  it  a  conceit  rather  than  a  metaphor,  a  fault 
copiously  illustrated  in  the  poetry  of  Cowley,  Waller,  Donne, 
and  others  of  that  ilk. 

Twelve  years  had  passed  since  then,  and  the  defects 
still  remained ;  indeed,  they  were  never  fully  corrected, 
and  to  some  extent  they  mar  even  his  best  work.  But 
he  now  had  new  encouragement  and  new  determina- 
tion to  remedy  them.  He  strove  diligently  to  perfect 
his  style.  How  great  the  strain  of  the  effort  was  can 


"  PSALM    OF    THE    WEST  "  393 

be  appreciated  only  when  we  remember  that  he  was 
handicapped  by  a  gnawing  and  fatal  disease,  and  by 
the  devotion  of  a  large  part  of  his  time  to  the  re- 
hearsals and  concerts  of  the  orchestra.  The  deep  in- 
spirations of  his  flute-playing  did  something  to  pro- 
long his  life,  but  the  meagerness  of  its  financial 
returns  almost  counterbalanced  this  advantage.  Only 
during  the  last  two  years  of  his  life  was  he  sufficiently 
free  from  monetary  cares  to  devote  himself  exclusively 
to  literature.  He  deserved  all  the  more  credit  for  the 
progress  which  he  made.  His  poem  "  Psalm  of  the 
West "  is  vague  and  prolix,  though  it  is  lit  up  by 
two  stanzas  referring  to  our  Civil  War,  in  which  the 
contestants  are  pictured  as  two  knights  in  a  medieval 
tournament : 

"They  charged,  they  struck;  both  fell,  both  bled; 

Brain  rose  again,  ungloved; 
Heart  fainting  smiled,  apd  softly  said, 
My  love  to  my  Beloved." 

Heart  and  Brain!  no  more  be  twain; 
Throb  and  think,  one  flesh  again! 
Lo!  they  weep,  they  turn,  they  run; 
Lo!  they  kiss:  Love,  thou  art  one! 


"  The  Marshes  of  Glynn  "  is  often  called  Lanier's 
best  production.  It  is  spontaneous  and  simple,  while 
at  the  same  time  it  is  mature  and  profound.  The  poet 
enters  into  the  life  of  Nature,  and  in  that  life  finds 
another  life  revealed,  even  the  life  of  God.  As  the 
tide  comes  in,  he  seems  to  himself  possessed  of  new 
purity  and  freedom,  because  he  can  put  his  weakness 
and  sin  into  the  care  of  limitless  mercy  and  love : 

2B 


394 

A  league  and  a  league  of  marsh-grass,  waist-high,  broad  in 

the  blade, 
Green,  and  all  of  a  height,  and  unflecked  with  a  light  or  a 

shade, 

Stretch  leisurely  off,  in  a  pleasant  plain, 
To  the  terminal  blue  of  the  main. 

Oh,  what  is  abroad  in  the  marsh  and  the  terminal  sea? 

Somehow  my  soul  seems  suddenly  free 
From  the  weighing  of  fate  and  the  sad  discussion  of  sin, 
By  the  length  and  the  breadth  and  the  sweep  of  the  marshes 
of  Glynn. 

Ye  marshes,  how  candid  and  simple  and  nothing-withholding 

and  free 
Ye  publish  yourselves  to  the  sky  and  offer  yourselves  to  the 

sea! 

Tolerant  plains,  that  suffer  the  sea  and  the  rains  and  the  sun, 
Ye  spread  and  span  like  the  catholic  man  who  hath  mightily 

won 

God  out  of  knowledge  and  good  out  of  infinite  pain 
And  sight  out  of  blindness  and  purity  out  of  a  stain. 

As  the  marsh-hen  secretly  builds  on  the  watery  sod, 

Behold  I  will  build  me  a  nest  on  the  greatness  of  God: 

I  will  fly  in  the  greatness  of  God  as  the  marsh-hen  flies 

In  the  freedom  that  fills  all  the  space  'twixt  the  marsh  and  the 

skies: 

By  so  many  roots  as  the  marsh-grass  sends  in  the  sod 
I  will  heartily  lay  me  a-hold  on  the  greatness  of  God: 
Oh,  like  to  the  greatness  of  God  is  the  greatness  within 
The  range  of  the  marshes,  the  liberal  marshes  of  Glynn. 

Here  is  not  only  insight  into  the  meaning  of  Nature 
which  would  do  credit  to  Wordsworth,  but  also  a 
mastery  of  form  which  would  do  credit  to  Shelley. 
The  "  Psalm  of  the  West "  seems  to  have  been  out- 
grown, and  a  larger  vision  of  truth  to  have  been 
gained.  Lanier's  lectures  at  Johns  Hopkins  Univer- 


INDIVIDUALITY  395 

sity  confirm  our  impression  that  the  last  years  were 
years  of  moral  and  religious  as  well  as  of  intellectual 
and  esthetic  progress.  He  believed  in  a  moral  self- 
hood which  was  no  mere  product  of  Nature,  but  which 
dominated  Nature  instead,  and  this  faith  he  expressed 
in  his  poem  entitled  "  Individuality  " : 

What  the  cloud  doeth 
The  Lord  knoweth, 
The  cloud  knoweth  not. 
What  the  artist  doeth, 
The  Lord  knoweth; 
Knoweth  the  artist  not? 

Well-answered! — O  dear  artists,  ye 
— Whether  in  forms  of  curve  or  hue 

Or  tone  your  gospels  be — • 
Say  wrong  This  work  is  not  of  me, 
But  God:  it  is  not  true,  it  is  not  true. 

Awful  is  Art  because  'tis  free. 
The  artist  trembles  o'er  his  plan 

Where  men  his  Self  must  see. 
Who  made  a  song  or  picture,  he 
Did  it,  and  not  another,  God  nor  man. 

My  Lord  is  large,  my  Lord  is  strong: 
Giving,  He  gave:  my  me  is  mine. 

How  poor,  how  strange,  how  wrong, 
To  dream  He  wrote  the  little  song 
I  made  to  Him  with  love's  unforced  design! 

We  fortunately  have  Lanier's  own  interpretation 
of  this  poem.  The  enormous  generalizations  of  mod- 
ern science  had  filled  him  with  dreams  like  those  of 
his  boyhood.  In  a  letter  to  a  friend  he  writes : 

It  is  precisely  at  the  beginning  of  that  phenomenon  which  is 
the  underlying  subject  of  this  poem,  "  Individuality,"  that  the 


396    THE    HIGH    MORAL   SPIRIT    IN    LANIER's   ART 

largest  of  such  generalizations  must  begin;  and  the  doctrine 
of  evolution  when  pushed  beyond  this  point  appears  to  me, 
after  the  most  careful  examination  of  the  evidence,  to  fail. 
It  is  pushed  beyond  this  point  in  its  current  application  to 
the  genesis  of  species;  and  I  think  Mr.  Huxley's  last  sweep- 
ing declaration  is  clearly  parallel  to  that  of  an  enthusiastic 
dissecter  who,  forgetting  that  his  observations  are  upon  dead 
bodies,  should  build  a  physiological  conclusion  upon  purely 
anatomical  facts.  For  whatever  can  be  proved  to  have  been 
evolved,  evolution  seems  to  me  a  noble  and  beautiful  and 
true  theory.  But  a  careful  search  has  not  shown  me  a  single 
instance  in  which  such  proof  as  would  stand  the  first  shot  of 
a  boy  lawyer  in  a  moot-court,  has  been  brought  forward  in 
support  of  an  actual  case  of  species-differentiation.  A  cloud 
(see  the  poem)  may  be  evolved;  but  not  an  artist;  and  I  find, 
in  looking  over  my  poem,  that  it  has  made  itself  into  a  pas- 
sionate reaffirmation  of  the  artist's  autonomy,  threatened  alike 
from  the  direction  of  the  scientific  fanatic  and  the  pantheistic 
devotee. 

So  human  individuality,  with  its  correlates  of  con- 
science and  will,  enables  us  to  interpret  the  poetic 
merging  of  man  in  God  which  we  find  in  "  The 
Marshes  of  Glynn."  In  God  we  "  live  and  move  and 
have  our  being  " ;  but  it  is  nevertheless  true  that  we 
are  still  free  and  responsible  creatures. 

William  Hayes  Ward  has  done  us  great  service  by 
pointing  out  that,  like  Milton  and  Ruskin,  Lanier  was 
dominated  by  the  beauty  of  holiness.  He  loved  indeed 
to  reverse  the  phrase,  and  to  speak  also  of  "  the  holi- 
ness of  beauty."  But  a  high  moral  spirit  informed 
all  his  art.  In  one  of  his  lectures  to  the  students  of 
Johns  Hopkins  University  he  declared  true  beauty 
and  true  holiness  to  be  one : 

Let  any  sculptor  hew  us  out  the  most  ravishing  combination 
of  tender  curves  and  spheric  softness  that  ever  stood  for 
woman;  yet  if  the  lip  have  a  certain  fulness  that  hints  of  the 


SCIENCE    OF  ENGLISH    VERSE  397 

flesh,  if  the  brow  be  insincere,  if  in  the  minutest  particular  the 
physical  beauty  suggest  a  moral  ugliness,  that  sculptor — un- 
less he  be  portraying  a  moral  ugliness  for  a  moral  purpose — 
may  as  well  give  over  his  marble  for  paving-stones.  Time, 
whose  judgments  are  inexorably  moral,  will  not  accept  his 
work.  For,  indeed,  we  may  say  that  he  who  has  not  yet  per- 
ceived how  artistic  beauty  and  moral  beauty  are  convergent 
lines  which  run  back  into  a  common  ideal  origin,  and  who 
therefore  is  not  afire  with  moral  beauty  just  as  with  artistic 
beauty — that  he,  in  short,  who  has  not  come  to  that  stage  of 
quiet  and  eternal  frenzy  in  which  the  beauty  of  holiness  and 
the  holiness  of  beauty  mean  one  thing,  burn  as  one  fire,  shine 
as  one  light  within  him — he  is  not  yet  the  great  artist. 

This  is  an  utterance  worthy  to  be  written  in  letters 
of  gold  and  posted  upon  the  walls  of  every  studio  of 
art.  It  shows  that  Lanier  was  finding  in  his  own 
work  a  moral  development  and  education.  He  wished 
to  subject  his  own  art  to  eternal  principles,  and  to 
make  a  conscience  of  poetry.  In  no  other  way  can 
I  understand  the  long  thought  and  labor  which  he 
gave  to  the  composition  of  his  "  Science  of  English 
Verse."  He  would  master  the  theory,  before  he  ven- 
tured further  upon  practice.  That  volume  is  proof  of 
his  wide  reading,  but  also  of  his  philosophical  acute- 
ness.  Whether  we  accept  its  conclusions  or  not,  we 
must  acknowledge  the  keen  insight  and  the  judicial 
spirit  with  which  it  is  written. 

Lanier's  "  Science  of  English  Verse  "  is  an  effort  to 
interpret  the  forms  of  poetry  in  terms  of  music.  He 
would  substitute  time-measurement  in  place  of  stress- 
measurement.  Poe  had  maintained  that  accent  makes 
a  syllable  always  long.  Lanier's  musical  instinct  re- 
jected this  doctrine,  and  while,  like  Poe,  he  insisted 
on  melody  as  indispensable  to  poetry,  he  held  that 


398  "  SPECIAL    PLEADING  " 

this  melody  is  the  product  of  rhythm,  tone,  and  color, 
rather  than  of  mere  stress  of  sound.  He  began  in 
"  Special  Pleading "  to  work  out  his  theory.  We 
must  acknowledge  that  this  poem  hardly  justifies  his 
contention.  Its  compound  substantives,  "  now-time," 
"  lonesome  -  tree,"  "  star  -  consummate,"  "  rose  -  com- 
plete," "  dusk-time,"  "  noon-time,"  seem  made  to 
order,  and  to  have  in  them  little  of  poetic  beauty. 
The  rhythm  itself  sounds  broken  and  unmusical,  and 
the  thought  is  not  of  sufficient  value  to  make  up  for  a 
certain  ambitious  thrusting  into  notice  of  the  merely 
formal  element  of  the  verse : 

Time,  hurry  my  Love  to  me: 
Haste,  haste!    Lov'st  not  good  company? 
Here's  but  a  heart-break  sandy  waste 
'Twixt  Now  and  Then.    Why,  killing  haste 
Were  best,  dear  Time,  for  thee,  for  thee! 


Sweet  Sometime,  fly  fast  to  me: 
Poor  Now-time  sits  in  the  Lonesome-tree 
And  broods  as  gray  as  any  dove, 
And  calls,  When  wilt  thou  come,  O  Love? 
And  pleads  across  the  waste  to  thee. 


Well,  be  it  dusk-time  or  noon-time, 

I  ask  but  one  small  boon,  Time: 
Come  thou  in  night,  come  thou  in  day, 
I  care  not,  I  care  not:  have  thine  own  way, 

But  only,  but  only,  come  soon,  Time. 

While  Lanier  sought  to  rescue  poetry  from  the  law- 
lessness of  mere  accent,  he  ran  the  risk  of  enslaving 
it  to  mere  rhythm.  Shakespeare  is  greatest  of  poets,  in 
large  part,  because  he  unites  the  most  delicate  sense 


CHRISTIAN    FAITH    IN    LANIER's    POEMS  399 

of  time-measurement  with  the  greatest  freedom  of 
accent.  In  his  later  work,  indeed,  there  is  the  most 
of  spontaneity,  with  the  least  of  mere  mechanism.  The 
rule  for  the  tyro  ceases  to  bind  the  master.  Lanier's 
music  too  much  dominated  his  poetry.  "  Sunrise," 
for  example,  while  noble  in  conception,  is  exceedingly 
faulty  in  execution.  The  effort  after  form  leads  to  dis- 
play of  words  with  little  meaning.  "  The  Science  of 
English  Verse"  is  a  useful  manual  for  the  beginner, 
but  it  presents  only  one  side  of  the  truth,  and  it  needs 
to  be  supplemented  by  considerations  drawn  from  the 
realm  of  the  ideal,  rather  than  from  the  realm  of 
musical  notation. 

Our  poet's  conscientiousness  appeared  more  and 
more  clearly  as  his  days  drew  near  to  their  end.  His 
sense  of  duty  was  grounded  in  religion.  While  in 
Oglethorpe  College  he  had  professed  his  Christian 
faith,  and  had  united  with  the  Presbyterian  Church. 
In  his  college  note-book  he  wrote : 

Liberty,  patriotism,  and  civilization  are  on  their  knees  be- 
fore the  men  of  the  South,  and  with  clasped  hands  and  strain- 
ing eyes  are  begging  them  to  become  Christians. 

This  Christian  faith  he  never  disowned.  He  learned 
to  criticize  the  forms  of  religion,  as  he  criticized  the 
forms  of  poetry,  without  ever  giving  up  their  spirit. 
We  find  him  in  his  later  life  skeptical  with  regard  to 
churches  and  denominations  and  creeds,  while  yet  he 
clung  to  his  old  beliefs  with  regard  to  sin  and  Christ 
and  salvation.  The  external  gave  way  to  the  internal. 
There  was  less  and  less  of  dependence  upon  self  and 
upon  human  aid,  but  more  and  more  dependence  upon 


4<X>  "  REMONSTRANCE  " 

the  infinite  pity  and  love  of  God,  as  they  are  made 
known  to  us  in  Jesus  Christ.  He  did  not  express  his 
faith  in  any  dogmatic  way,  but  this  theology  is  implicit 
in  his  poems,  as  I  shall  proceed  to  illustrate.  Let  me 
begin  with  his  poem  entitled  "  Remonstrance  " : 

"  Opinion,  let  me  alone:  I  am  not  thine. 
Prim  Creed,  with  categoric  point,  forbear 

To  feature  me  my  Lord  by  rule  and  line. 
Thou  canst  not  measure  Mistress  Nature's  hair, 

Not  one  sweet  inch:  nay,  if  thy  sight  is  sharp, 
Would'st  count  the  strings  upon  an  angel's  harp? 
Forbear,  forbear. 

"  Oh  let  me  love  my  Lord  more  fathom  deep 
Than  there  is  line  to  sound  with:  let  me  love 
My  fellow  not  as  men  that  mandates  keep: 
Yea,  all  that's  lovable,  below,  above, 

That  let  me  love  by  heart,  by  heart,  because 
(Free  from  the  penal  pressure  of  the  laws) 
I  find  it  fair. 


"  I  would  thou  left'st  me  free,  to  live  with  love, 
And  faith,  that  through  the  love  of  love  doth  find 

My  Lord's  dear  presence  in  the  stars  above, 
The  clods  below,  the  flesh  without,  the  mind 

Within,  the  bread,  the  tear,  the  smile. 
Opinion,  damned  Intriguer,  gray  with  guile, 
Let  me  alone." 

In  "  A  Florida  Sunday  "  he  recognizes  the  grain  of 
truth  in  pantheism,  while  he  asserts  just  as  clearly  the 
independence  and  responsibility  of  each  human  soul : 

All  riches,  goods  and  braveries  never  told 
Of  earth,  sun,  air  and  heaven — now  I  hold 
Your  being  in  my  being;  I  am  ye, 
And  ye  myself;  yea,  lastly,  Thee, 


"  ACKNOWLEDGMENT  4OI 

God,  whom  my  roads  all  reach,  howe'er  they  run, 
My  Father,  Friend,  Beloved,  dear  All-One, 
Thee  in  my  soul,  my  soul  in  Thee,  I  feel, 
Self  of  my  self.  .  . 


And  I  am  one  with  all  the  kinsmen  things 
That  e'er  my  Father  fathered.    Oh,  to  me 
All  questions  solve  in  this  tranquillity; 
E'en  this  dark  matter,  once  so  dim,  so  drear, 
Now  shines  upon  my  spirit  heavenly-clear: 
Thou,  Father,  without  logic,  tellest  me 
How  this  divine  denial  true  may  be, 
— How  All's  in  each,  yet  every  one  of  all 
Maintains  his  Self  complete  and  several. 

The  problem  of  sin  at  times  perplexed  our  poet,  as 
it  has  perplexed  every  thoughtful  soul  since  the  world 
began.  How  can  a  holy  and  omnipotent  God  permit 
moral  evil  ?  The  only  answer  is :  It  is  the  condition 
of  the  highest  virtue  that  man  should  be  free;  and 
freedom  to  choose  the  good  implies  also  freedom  to 
choose  the  evil.  Only  faith  in  God's  perfect  love 
enables  us  to  face  the  problem  calmly,  and  still  to  be- 
lieve that  in  the  end  God  will  justify  his  ways  to  men. 
In  his  poem,  "  Acknowledgment,"  Lanier  has  grappled 
with  the  problem,  and  has  given  the  true  solution: 

If  I  do  ask,  How  God  can  dumbness  keep 

While  Sin  creeps  grinning  through  His  house  of  Time, 
Stabbing  His  saintliest  children  in  their  sleep. 

And  staining  holy  walls  with  clots  of  crime? — 
Or,  How  may  He  whose  wish  but  names  a  fact 

Refuse  what  miser's-scanting  of  supply 
Would  richly  glut  each  void  where  man  hath  lacked 

Of  grace  or  bread? — or,  How  may  Power  deny 
Wholeness  to  th'  almost-folk  that  hurt  our  hope — 

These  heart-break  Hamlets  who  so  barely  fail 


4O2  OPPOSITION 

In  life  or  art  that  but  a  hair's  more  scope 

Had  set  them  fair  on  heights  they  ne'er  may  scale? — 
Somehow  by  thee,  dear  Love,  I  win  content: 
Thy  Perfect  stops  th'  Imperfect's  argument. 

Not  hardest  Fortune's  most  unbounded  stress 
Can  blind  my  soul  nor  hurl  it  from  on  high, 
Possessing  thee,  the  self  of  loftiness, 
And  very  light  that  Light  discovers  by. 

Howe'er  thou  turn'st,  wrong  Earth!  still  Love's  in  sight: 
For  we  are  taller  than  the  breadth  of  night. 

And  in  "Clover"  he  adds  the  needful  injunction: 

"  Tease  not  thy  vision  with  vain  search  for  ends. 
The  End  of  Means  is  art  that  works  by  love. 
The  End  of  Ends  ...  in  God's  Beginning's  lost." 

Some  of  these  utterances  are  enigmatical.  It  is 
quite  possible  that  the  poet  himself  had  not  reached 
entire  clearness  of  thought,  and  that  his  verse  simply 
reflects  his  own  dimness  of  vision.  Yet  the  drift  is 
plain.  He  trusts  an  overruling  Wisdom,  even  though 
that  Wisdom  is  for  the  present  inscrutable  to  us.  Some 
at  least  of  God's  dealings,  untoward  at  first  sight,  have 
ultimate  value  and  meaning.  Lanier's  poem  "  Oppo- 
sition "  teaches  us  to  trust,  where  we  cannot  fully 
understand : 

Of  fret,  of  dark,  of  thorn,  of  chill, 

Complain  no  more;  for  these,  O  heart, 

Direct  the  random  of  the  will 

As  rhymes  direct  the  rage  of  art. 


Of  fret,  of  dark,  of  thorn,  of  chill, 

Complain  thou  not,  O  heart;  for  these 

Bank-in  the  current  of  the  will 
To  uses,  arts,  and  charities. 


"  HOW    LOVE    LOOKED    FOR    HELL  "  403 

In  "  Rose-Morals  "  the  poet  seems  to  teach  that  the 
only  refuge  of  the  afflicted  soul  is  found  in  that  prayer- 
fulness  which  links  our  work  and  our  fate  with  the 
will  of  the  Eternal : 

Soul,  get  thee  to  the  heart 

Of  yonder  tuberose:  hide  thee  there — 
There  breathe  the  meditations  of  thine  art 
Suffused  with  prayer. 

Of  spirit  grave  yet  light, 

How  fervent  fragrances  uprise 

Pure-born  from  these  most  rich  and  yet  most  white 
Virginities! 

Mulched  with  unsavory  death, 

Grow,  Soul!  unto  such  white  estate, 
That  virginal-prayerful  art  shall  be  thy  breath, 
Thy  work,  thy  fate. 

It  is  cheering  and  even  thrilling  to  see  how  this 
heroic  soul,  with  the  clouds  of  failure  and  death  lower- 
ing about  him,  still  perceived  Love  ruling  in  the 
universe,  and  making  all  things  work  together  for 
good.  "  How  Love  Looked  for  Hell  "  is  a  declaration 
that  even  penal  suffering  is  referable  to  eternal  Good- 
ness : 

"  To  heal  his  heart  of  long-time  pain 
One  day  Prince  Love  for  to  travel  was  fain 

With  Ministers  Mind  and  Sense. 
'  Now  what  to  thee  most  strange  may  be?' 
Quoth  Mind  and  Sense.    'All  things  above, 
One  curious  thing  I  first  would  see — 

Hell,'  quoth  Love. 


"  There,  while  they  stood  in  a  green  wood 
And  marvelled  still  on  111  and  Good, 
Came  suddenly  Minister  Mind. 


404  HOW    LOVE    LOOKED    FOR    HELL 

'  In  the  heart  of  sin  doth  hell  begin: 
'Tis  not  below,  'Tis  not  above, 
It  lieth  within,  it  lieth  within': 
('  Where?  '  quoth  Love?) 

" '  I  saw  a  man  sit  by  a  corse; 
Hell's  in  the  murderer's  breast:  remorse! 

Thus  clamored  his  mind  to  his  mind: 
Not  fleshly  dole  is  the  sinner's  goal, 
Hell's  not  below,  nor  yet  above, 
'Tis  fixed  in  the  ever-damned  soul ' — 

'  Fixed?  '  quoth  Love — • 


" '  In  dreams,  again,  I  plucked  a  flower 
That  clung  with  pain  and  stung  with  power, 

Yea,  nettled  me,  body  and  mind.1 
'  'Twas  the  nettle  of  sin,  'twas  medicine; 
No  need  nor  seed  of  it  here  Above; 
In  dreams  of  hate  true  loves  begin.' 

'  True,'  quoth  Love. 

"  '  Now  strange,'  quoth  Sense,  and  '  Strange  '  quoth 

Mind, 
'  We  saw  it,  and  yet  'tis  hard  to  find, 

— But  we  saw  it,'  quoth  Sense  and  Mind. 
'  Stretched  on  the  ground,  beautiful-crowned 
Of  the  piteous  willow  that  wreathed  above, 
But  I  cannot  find  where  ye  have  found 

Hell,'  quoth  Love." 

But  here  Lanier  in  part  misses  the  truth.  He  sees  that 
Hell  begins  in  the  heart  of  Sin,  and  that  Remorse  is 
Hell.  But  he  makes  Remorse  to  be  Repentance,  and 
Sin  to  furnish  its  own  medicine,  so  that  in  the  very 
act  of  penal  suffering  Hell  is  made  to  vanish  away. 
The  obduracy  of  an  evil  will  is  not  taken  account  of. 
It  is  not  Mind  and  Sense  alone  that  demand  punish- 
ment for  persistent  iniquity.  Conscience  and  Reason 


"  EVENING    SONG  "  405 

also  echo  the  words  of  Holy  Writ:  "The  soul  that 
sinneth,  it  shall  die."  Dante's  inscription  over  the 
gate  of  the  Inferno  is  more  true  than  Lanier's  verse: 

"Justice  incited  my  sublime  Creator; 
Created  me  divine  Omnipotence, 
The  highest  Wisdom  and  the  Primal  Love." 

He  had  little  to  look  forward  to  in  this  world :  he 
yearned  all  the  more  for  a  world-  to  come.  Rarely  do 
we  find  in  literature  so  strong  a  faith  in  immortality. 
His  struggle  with  disease  had  gone  on  for  three  whole 
years  when  he  wrote  to  his  wife  this  "  Evening  Song  "  : 

Look  off,  dear  Love,  across  the  sallow  sands, 
And  mark  yon  meeting  of  the  sun  and  sea, 
How  long  they  kiss  in  sight  of  all  the  lands. 
Ah!  longer,  longer,  we. 

Now  in  the  sea's  red  vintage  melts  the  sun, 
As  Egypt's  pearl  dissolved  in  rosy  wine, 
And  Cleopatra  night  drinks  all.     'Tis  done,          » 
Love,  lay  thine  hand  in  mine. 

Come  forth,  sweet  stars,  and  comfort  heaven's  heart; 

Glimmer,  ye  waves,  round  else  unlighted  sands. 
O  night!  divorce  our  sun  and  sky  apart; 
Never  our  lips,  our  hands. 

And  death  to  him  is  only  new  and  perfect  converse 
with  the  elect  spirits  of  all  time.  It  is  the  drinking 
of  "  The  Stirrup-Cup  "  whose  wine  will  be  better  than 
any  fabled  nectar  of  the  gods : 

Death,  thou'rt  a  cordial  old  and  rare: 
Look  how  compounded,  with  what  care! 
Time  got  his  wrinkles  reaping  thee 
Sweet  herbs  from  all  antiquity. 


406  "  A   SONG   OF   THE    FUTURE  " 

David  to  thy  distillage  went, 
Keats,  and  Gotama  excellent, 
Omar  Khayyam,  and  Chaucer  bright, 
And  Shakspere  for  a  king-delight. 

Then,  Time,  let  not  a  drop  be  spilt: 
Hand  me  the  cup  whene'er  thou  wilt; 
'Tis  thy  rich  stirrup-cup  to  me; 
I'll  drink  it  down  right  smilingly. 


He  has  no  fear  for  his  work.  The  song  which  God 
has  inspired,  God  will  preserve.  "  A  Song  of  the 
Future  "  seems  to  express  this  hope,  trembling,  yet  con- 
fident: 

Sail  fast,  sail  fast, 

Ark  of  my  hopes,  Ark  of  my  dreams; 
Sweep  lordly  o'er  the  drowned  Past, 
Fly  glittering  through  the  sun's  strange  beams; 

Sail  fast,  sail  fast. 

Breaths  of  new  buds  from  off  some  drying  lea 
With  news  about  the  Future  scent  the  sea: 
My  brain  is  beating  like  the  heart  of  Haste: 
I'll  loose  me  a  bird  upon  this  Present  waste; 

Go,  trembling  song, 
And  stay  not  long;  oh,  stay  not  long: 
Thou'rt  only  a  gray  and  sober  dove, 
But  thine  eye  is  faith  and  thy  wing  is  love. 


"  Sunrise  "  is  Lanier's  last  poem,  dictated  when  he 
was  too  weak  to  write.  Its  singularities  show  the  lack 
of  revision;  yet,  with  much  that  is  below  the  level  of 
his  best,  there  are  bursts  of  true  poetry  which  merit 
our  praise.  The  rise  of  the  sun  over  the  marshes,  and 
the  flooding  of  the  world  with  his  light,  symbolize 
to  the  poet  the  lifting  up  of  his  frailty  into  the  infinite 
life  of  God ; 


407 

Thou  chemist  of  storms,  whether  driving  the  winds  a-swirl 

Or  a-flicker  the  subtiler  essences  polar  that  whirl 

In  the  magnet  earth, — yea,  thou  with  a  storm  for  a  heart, 

Rent  with  debate,  many-spotted  with  question,  part 

From  part  oft  sundered,  yet  ever  a  globed  light, 

Yet  ever  the  artist,  ever  more  large  and  bright 

Than  the  eye  of  man  may  avail  of: — manifold  One, 

I  must  pass  from  thy  face,  I  must  pass  from  the  face  of  the 

Sun: 

Old  Want  is  awake  and  agog,  every  wrinkle  a-frown; 
The  worker  must  pass  to  his  work  in  the  terrible  town: 
But  I  fear  not,  nay,  and  I  fear  not  the  thing  to  be  done; 

I  am  strong  with  the  strength  of  my  lord  the  Sun: 
How  dark,  how  dark  soever  the  race  that  must  needs  be  run, 
I  am  lit  with  the  Sun. 


And  ever  my  heart  through  the  night  shall  with  knowledge 

abide  thee, 

And  ever  by  day  shall  my  spirit,  as  one  that  hath  tried  thee, 
Labor,  at  leisure,  in  art, — till  yonder  beside  thee 
My  soul  shall  float,  friend  Sun, 
The  day  being  done. 

Lanier's  greatest  poem,  to  our  mind,  is  "  The  Crys- 
tal." It  is  his  greatest  because  it  combines  the  most 
of  critical  judgment  with  the  clearest  confession  of  his 
faith  in  Christ.  He  gives  us  estimates  of  the  world's 
greatest  teachers,  estimates  so  mature  and  convincing 
as  to  show  that  he  might  have  made  his  mark  in 
literary  criticism.  I  can  select  only  a  few  names  of 
those  whom  he  has  described,  but  they  will  demon- 
strate the  justice  of  his  thought  as  well  as  the  incisive- 
ness  of  its  expression.  Only  the  imagination  of  a 
poet  could  so  seize  upon  the  central  characteristic  of 
its  subject  and  set  it  forth  so  luminously.  Let  us 
instance  Buddha : 


4O8  "  THE    CRYSTAL  " 

So,  Buddha,  beautiful!    I  pardon  thee 
That  all  the  All  thou  hadst  for  needy  man 
Was  Nothing,  and  thy  Best  of  being  was 
But  not  to  be. 

Worn  Dante,  I  forgive 

The  implacable  hates  that  in  thy  horrid  hells 
Or  burn  or  freeze  thy  fellows,  never  loosed 
By  death,  nor  time,  nor  love. 

And  I  forgive 

Thee,  Milton,  those  thy  comic-dreadful  wars 
Where,  armed  with  gross  and  inconclusive  steel, 
Immortals  smite  immortals  mortalwise 
And  fill  all  heaven  with  folly. 

Also  thee, 

Brave  ^schylus,  thee  I  forgive,  for  that 
Thine  eye,  by  bare  bright  justice  basilisked, 
Turned  not,  nor  ever  learned  to  look  where  Love 
Stands  shining. 

So,  unto  thee,  Lucretius  mine 
(For  oh,  what  heart  hath  loved  thee  like  to  this 
That's  now  complaining?),  freely  I  forgive 
Thy  logic  poor,  thine  error  rich,  thine  earth 
Whose  graves  eat  souls  and  all. 

So  pass  in  review  Marcus  Aurelius,  Thomas  a  Kempis, 
Epictetus,  Behmen,  Swedenborg,  Langley,  Csedmon, 
all  pictured  in  single  sentences,  but  with  master-strokes 
that  open  to  us  the  very  life.  Coming  down  to  our 
own  day  we  have 

Emerson, 

Most  wise,  that  yet,  in  rinding  Wisdom,  lost 
Thy  Self,  sometimes;  tense  Keats,  with  angels'  nerves, 
Where  men's  were  better;  Tennyson,  largest  voice 
Since  Milton,  yet  some  register  of  wit 
Wanting; — all,  all,  I  pardon,  ere  'tis  asked, 
Your  more  or  less,  your  little  mole  that  marks 
You  brother  and  your  kinship  seals  to  man. 


LANIER  S   TRIBUTE   TO    CHRIST  409 

And  finally,  in  contrast  to  all  these  human  teachers, 
Lanier  presents  to  us  his  picture  of  Him  who  is  the 
Teacher  of  all  true  teachers,  even  as  He  is  the  King 
of  kings  and  the  Lord  of  lords : 

But  Thee,  but  Thee,  O  sovereign  Seer  of  time, 

But  Thee,  O  poets'  Poet,  Wisdom's  Tongue, 

But  Thee,  O  man's  best  Man,  O  love's  best  Love, 

O  perfect  life  in  perfect  labor  writ, 

O  all  men's  Comrade,  Servant,  King,  or  Priest, — 

What  if  or  yet,  what  mole,  what  flaw,  what  lapse, 

What  least  defect  or  shadow  of  defect, 

What  rumor,  tattled  by  an  enemy, 

Of  inference  loose,  what  lack  of  grace 

Even  in  torture's  grasp,  or  sleep's,  or  death's, — 

Oh,  what  amiss  may  I  forgive  in  Thee, 

Jesus,  good  Paragon,  thou  Crystal  Christ? 

In  all  the  great  writers  and  great  men  of  history  he 
could  find  flaws  which  needed  forgiveness.  But  Christ 
is  so  free  from  fault,  so  crystal-clear,  that  God's  rays 
of  truth  and  love  can  shine  through  him  without  hin- 
drance. This  perfect  transparency  to  the  divine  proves 
him  to  be  himself  divine,  our  proper  and  only  Prophet, 
Priest,  and  King.  This  seems  to  be  the  substance 
of  Lanier's  theology.  We  could  wish  that  he  went 
further,  and  saw  as  clearly  that  the  universal  need  of 
forgiveness  implies  a  holiness  in  God  which  makes  for- 
giveness difficult;  so  difficult  indeed  that  only  Christ's 
suffering  on  account  of  sin  renders  it  consistent  that 
God  should  forgive.  Our  poet  believed  in  God's  holi- 
ness, for  his  own  conscience  reflected  it.  He  believed 
also  that  sin  brings  suffering  to  the  holy  God  as  well 
as  to  the  guilty  transgressor.  If  he  had  put  together 
the  two  facts  of  God's  holiness  and  God's  love,  he 

2C 


4IO  LANIER  S   AFFECTION    AND   OPTIMISM 

would  have  seen  that  Christ's  Cross  is  the  only  solu- 
tion of  the  problem  how  God  can  forgive  sin;  for, 
in  that  Cross,  are  manifested  God's  holiness  necessitat- 
ing suffering,  and  God's  love  enduring  suffering,  for 
men's  salvation. 

Though  his  faith  in  God's  holiness  did  not  lead  him 
to  its  proper  logical  conclusion,  it  did  lead  him  to  try 
all  art  by  the  highest  and  severest  of  tests.  He  was 
no  believer  in  "  art  .for  art's  sake."  Art  has  a  nobler 
mission — the  revelation  of  divine  purity  and  love.  He 
could  criticize  Whitman,  Swinburne,  and  Morris,  not 
only,  for  their  lapses  from  that  ideal  standard;  even 
Shakespeare  is  subjected  to  condemnatory  judgment 
for  his  occasionally  "  labored-lewd  discourse  " ;  Homer 
too,  for  his  "  too  soiled  a  patch  to  broider  with  the 
gods  " ;  and  even  Socrates,  for  his  "  words  of  truth 
that,  mildlier  spoke,  had  manlier  wrought."  Yet  he 
was  a  great  lover  of  great  men,  and  specially  of  family, 
friends,  and  institutions  that  had  sympathized  with 
him  and  helped  him.  We  have  seen  how  he  loved  his 
wife,  reverenced  his  father,  cared  for  his  brother.  He 
celebrates  Charlotte  Cushman,  as  "  Art's  artist,  Love's 
dear  woman,  Fame's  good  queen  " ;  Bayard  Taylor, 
as  mingling  now  with  Plato  and  the  bards  of  ancient 
and  of  modern  times ;  and  Dr.  Thomas  Shearer,  on  his 
presenting  a  portrait-bust  of  the  author : 

Since  you.  rare  friend!  have  tied  my  living  tongue 
With  thanks  more  large  than  man  e'er  said  or  sung, 

So  let  the  dumbness  of  this  image  be 
My  eloquence,  and  still  interpret  me. 

To  his  class,  on  certain  fruits  and  flowers  sent  him  in 
sickness,  he  writes : 


TO    RICHARD    WAGNER  411 

If  these  the  products  be  of  love  and  pain, 
Oft  may  I  suffer,  and  you  love,  again. 

But  to  Johns  Hopkins  University,  that  had  first  given 
its  academic  recognition  to  his  merit,  and  had  made 
him  one  of  its  honored  instructors,  he  pours  forth  a 
noble  tribute  of  gratitude  in  his  "  Ode,"  read  on  the 
fourth  Commemoration  Day,  February,  1880: 

How  tall  among  her  sisters,  and  how  fair, — 
How  grave  beyond  her  youth,  yet  debonair 
As  dawn,  'mid  wrinkled  Matres  of  old  lands 
Our  youngest  Alma  Mater  modest  stands! 

And  he  calls  upon  the  new  university  to  inaugurate  a 
reign  of  culture  in  our  western  world : 

Bring  old  Renown 

To  walk  familiar  citizen  of  the  town, — 
Bring  Tolerance,  that  can  kiss  and  disagree, — 
Bring  Virtue,  Honor,  Truth,  and  Loyalty, — 
Bring  Faith  that  sees  with  undissembling  eyes, — 
Bring  all  large  Loves  and  heavenly  Charities, — 
Till  man  seem  less  a  riddle  unto  man 
And  fair  Utopia  less  Utopian, 
And  many  peoples  call  from  shore  to  shore, 
The  world  has  bloomed  again,  at  Baltimore! 

Lanier's  poem  "  To  Richard  Wagner  "  expresses  his 
own  ambition  to  interpret  our  modern  world  by  the 
music  of  poetry : 

"  O  Wagner,  westward  bring  thy  heavenly  art, 

Xo  trifler  thou:  Siegfried  and  Wotan  be 
Names  for  big  ballads  of  the  modern  heart. 

Thine  ears  hear  deeper  than  thine  eyes  can  see. 
Voice  of  the  monstrous  mill,  the  shouting  mart, 

Not  less  of  airy  cloud  and  wave  and  tree, 
Thou,  thou,  if  even  to  thyself  unknown, 

Hast  power  to  say  the  Time  in  terms  of  tone." 


412  TO    BEETHOVEN 

His  verses  "  To  Beethoven  "  celebrate  the  dignity  of 
music,  in  the  person  of  the  great  composer : 

In  o'er-strict  calyx  lingering, 

Lay  music's  bud  too  long  unblown, 
Till  thou,  Beethoven,  breathed  the  spring: 

Then  bloomed  the  perfect  rose  of  tone. 

0  Psalmist  of  the  weak,  the  strong, 
O  Troubadour  of  love  and  strife, 

Co-Litanist  of  right  and  wrong, 
Sole  Hymner  of  the  whole  of  life, 

1  know  not  how,  I  care  not  why, 
Thy  music  brings  this  broil  at  ease, 

And  melts  my  passion's  mortal  cry 
In  satisfying  symphonies. 

Yea,  it  forgives  me  all  my  sins, 

Fits  life  to  love  like  rhyme  to  rhyme, 

And  tunes  the  task  each  day  begins 
By  the  last  trumpet-note  of  Time. 

Lanier  was  an  optimist,  not  that  he  believed  all 
things  to  be  good,  but  that  he  believed  all  things  work 
together  for  good,  under  the  government  of  a  holy 
and  loving  God.  He  believed  in  Christ,  as  the  divine 
Governor,  in  nature  and  in  history.  In  "  Tiger-Lilies  " 
he  wrote: 

Here,  one's  soul  may  climb  as  upon  Pisgah,  and  see  one's  land 
Of  peace,  seeing  Christ,  who  made  all  these  beautiful  things. 

In  other  words,  it  is  Christ  who  has  created  all  things, 
and  in  whom  all  things  consist,  or  hold  together.  This 
enables  us  to  understand  what  otherwise  might  be 
thought  a  mere  poetical  fancy,  I  mean  his  attributing 
prayer  even  to  the  trees  of  the  forest : 


LANIERS    INTERPRETATION    OF    NATURE          413 

The  trees  that  ever  lifted  their  arms  toward  heaven,  obey- 
ing the  injunction  of  the  Apostle,  praying  always, — the  great 
uncomplaining  trees,  whose  life  is  surely  the  finest  of  all  lives, 
since  it  is  nothing  but  a  continual  growing  and  being  beau- 
tiful. 

And  in  his  lectures  on  Shakespeare  at  Johns  Hopkins 
University  he  adds  an  instructive  comment  on  the  uses 
of  Nature: 

To  him  who  rightly  understands  Nature,  she  is  more  than 
Ariel  and  Ceres  to  Prospero;  she  is  more  than  a  servant  con- 
quered like  Caliban,  to  fetch  wood  for  us:  she  is  a  friend  and 
comforter;  and  to  that  man  the  cares  of  the  world  are  but  a 
fabulous  Midsummer  Night's  Dream,  to  smile  at — he  is  ever 
in  sight  of  the  morning  and  in  hand-reach  of  God. 

All  this  interprets  to  us  his  conception  of  his  own 
vocation,  together  with  its  central  importance  and  dig- 
nity: 

It  is  the  poet  who  must  sit  at  the  centre  of  things  here,  as 
surely  as  some  great  One  sits  at  the  centre  of  things  Yonder, 
and  who  must  teach  us  how  to  control,  with  temperance  and 
perfect  art  and  unforgetfulness  of  detail,  all  our  oppositions, 
so  that  we  may  come  to  say  with  Aristotle,  at  last,  that  poetry 
is  more  philosophical  than  philosophy  and  more  historical 
than  history. 

In  the  biography  of  Lanier  by  Mims,  the  most  sugges- 
tive and  valuable  paragraph,  from  our  point  of  view, 
is  that  one  in  which  is  described  our  poet's  conception 
of  the  meaning  and  use  of  music,  and  I  venture  to 
quote  the  whole  of  it,  as  indicating  the  place  he  must 
occupy  in  the  history  of  art : 

"Lanier  believed  in  the  religious  value  of  music;  it  was  a 
'  gospel  whereof  the  people  are  in  great  need, — a  later  revela- 


414          MUSIC    OVERRATED   IN    LANIER  S    POEMS 

tion  of  all  gospels  in  one';  'music/  he  says,  'is  to  be  the 
Church  of  the  future,  wherein  all  creeds  will  unite  like  the 
tones  in  a  chord.'  He  was  one  of  '  those  fervent  souls  who  fare 
easily  by  this  road  to  the  Lord.'  Haydn's  inscription,  '  Laus 
Deo,'  was  in  Lanier's  mind  whenever  he  listened  to  great 
music;  for  it  tended  to  '  help  the  emotions  of  man  across  the 
immensity  of  the  known  into  the  boundaries  of  the  Un- 
known.' He  would  have  composers  to  be  ministers  of  re- 
ligion. He  could  not  understand  the  indifference  of  some 
leaders  of  orchestras,  who  could  be  satisfied  with  appealing 
to  the  aesthetic  emotions  of  an  audience,  while  they  might 
'  set  the  hearts  of  fifteen  hundred  people  afire.'  The  final 
meaning  of  music  to  him  was  that  it  created  within  man  '  a 
great,  pure,  unanalyzable  yearning  after  God.' " 

It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  Lanier  regarded  him- 
self as  the  apostle  of  a  new  era,  in  which  poetry  should 
have  music  as  its  continual  ministrant  and  helper. 
For  this  reason  he  cultivated  not  only  his  musical  gifts, 
but  also  all  his  gifts  of  mind  and  heart.  He  sought 
to  apply  the  scientific  method  to  the  study  of  poetry, 
and  he  conceived  that  he  had  improved  the  art  by 
his  discovery  that  rhythm,  tone,  and  color,  and  not 
mere  stress,  are  its  essentials.  He  probably  erred  in 
thinking  the  science  of  versification  more  important 
than  it  is  in  reality.  But  he  made  up  for  this  error  by 
his  constant  insistence  upon  the  moral  significance  of 
poetry,  and  by  his  subjection  of  all  art  to  the  final 
standard  of  God's  purity  and  love.  Being  himself  a 
great  musician,  he  overrated  music,  and  made  it  too 
dominant  an  element  in  his  own  compositions.  We 
cannot  doubt  that  some  great  poetry,  like  that  of 
Wordsworth,  is  deficient  in  musical  quality.  Un- 
rhythmical enunciation  of  important  thought  has  some- 
times all  the  effect,  and  even  more  than  the  effect,  of 


LANIER  S   INDOMITABLE   SPIRIT  415 

the  most  melodious  and  measured  utterance.  To 
Lanier's  contention  that  the  basis  of  rhythm  is  time, 
not  accent,  we  would  modestly  reply  that  the  basis  of 
rhythm  is  both  time  and  accent ;  the  former  giving  us 
the  form,  the  latter  giving  us  the  substance,  of  poetry. 
Which  of  the  two,  form  or  substance,  is  most  im- 
portant, is  like  the  question  which  blade  of  the  shears 
does  the  cutting.  No  poetry  is  great  which  is  not  a 
combination  of  the  two;  for  the  one  is  soul,  the  other 
is  body;  and  though  soul  is  the  primary  and  dominant 
element,  it  will  never  make  itself  known  to  men  ex- 
cept through  the  body  which  manifests  it. 

We  are  reminded  again  of  the  contrast  between 
the  two  Southern  poets,  Lanier  and  Poe.  Poe  had 
inveighed  against  "  the  heresy  of  the  didactic."  He 
disdained  all  aims  in  art  except  the  rousing  of  emotion. 
Lanier,  on  the  other  hand,  held  that  art  has  a  moral 
end.  This  gave  to  his  poetry  a  joyful  and  hopeful  air, 
while  Poe's  was  enveloped  in  cloud  and  gloom.  This 
made  Lanier  himself  a  steady  and  indomitable  worker, 
even  to  the  very  end  of  his  days,  while  Poe  worked 
only  in  the  intervals  of  debauch.  When  strength  failed, 
Lanier  was  still  undaunted.  There  was  nothing  sor- 
rowful in  his  heroism.  He  cheered  others  when  he 
could  have  no  hope  for  himself,  at  least  in  this  present 
life.  He  dictated  his  poem  "  Sunrise  "  with  a  fever 
of  one  hundred  and  four  degrees,  when  he  was  too 
weak  to  hold  a  pen  or  to  lift  food  to  his  mouth.  His 
last  lectures  were  read  from  his  chair;  every  sentence 
seemed  as  if  it  might  be  his  last ;  in  the  carriage,  after 
the  lecture  was  over,  his  exhaustion  was  so  great  that 
it  was  a  problem  whether  he  could  reach  his  home 


4l6        LANIER   A   GREAT    POET    IN    THE    MAKING 

alive.  On  November  19,  1880,  he  wrote  to  Paul 
Hamilton  Hayne: 

For  six  months  past  a  ghastly  fever  has  been  taking  posses- 
sion of  me  each  day  at  about  twelve  M.,  and  holding  my  head 
under  the  surface  of  indescribable  distress  for  the  next  twenty 
hours,  subsiding  only  enough  each  morning  to  let  me  get  on 
my  working-harness,  but  never  intermitting.  A  number  of 
tests  show  it  to  be  not  the  "  hectic  "  so  well  known  in  con- 
sumption; and  to  this  day  it  has  baffled  all  the  skill  I  could 
find  in  New  York,  in  Philadelphia,  and  here.  I  have  myself 
been  disposed  to  think  it  arose  purely  from  the  bitterness  of 
having  to  spend  my  time  in  making  academic  lectures  and 
boy's  books — pot-boilers  all — when  a  thousand  songs  are 
singing  in  my  heart  that  will  certainly  kill  me  if  I  do  not 
utter  them  soon.  But  I  don't  think  this  diagnosis  has  found 
favor  with  any  practical  physician;  and  meantime  I  work  day 
after  day  in  such  suffering  as  is  piteous  to  see. 

The  end  was  sure  to  come,  and  speedily.  He  was 
taken  to  Polk  County,  North-  Carolina,  to  camp  out  in 
the  open  air,  in  hope  that  this  might  bring  relief.  But 
there  he  was  seized  with  deadly  illness.  The  closing 
scene  is  best  described-  by  Mrs.  Lanier,  who  was  with 
him  to  the  end : 

"  We  are  left  alone  (August  29th)  with  one  another.  On  the 
last  night  of  the  summer  comes  a  change.  His  love  and  im- 
mortal will  hold  off  the  destroyer  of  our  summer  yet  one 
more  week,  until  the  forenoon  of  September  7th,  and  then 
falls  the  frost,  and  that  unfaltering  will  renders  its  supreme 
submission  to  the  adored  will  of  God." 

Lanier  was  not  a  great  poet,  but  he  had  in  him  the 
making  of  a  great  poet.  He  had  made  unmistakable 
progress  in  his  art;  his  best  work  is,  in  occasional 
passages,  equal  to  any  other  work  of  his  country,  if 
not  of  his  time.  There  are  lightning-flashes  of  true 


AN    ARGUMENT    FOR    IMMORTALITY  417 

poetry,  which  seem  to  promise  the  advent  of  an  illu- 
minating sun.  But  the  poet  has  not  his  powers  under 
full  control;  he  runs  off  upon  a  tangent  when  a  fancy 
strikes  him;  and  these  fancies  often  turn  out  to  be 
only  conceits.  He  has  originality,  but  he  seems  too 
often  to  be  straining  after  novelty.  He  has  the  gift 
of  melody,  but  he  sometimes  mars  the  music  of  his 
verse  by  the  effort  to  bring  it'  into  harmony  with  a 
mechanical  theory.  In  short,  he  lacks,  except  at  rare 
moments,  the  spontaneity  that  belongs  to  the  highest 
poetical  achievement,  and  the  inevitableness  of  the 
truest  poetical  inspiration.  But,  when  all  this  is  said, 
we  have  still  to  take  account  of  a  noble  poetic  gift  in 
process  of  development — a  gift  so  noble  as  to  cause 
unending  sorrow,  when  we  see  it  coming  to  its  earthly 
end. 

Such  an  end1  of  such  a  gift  suggests  to  us  one  of  the 
most  serious  problems  of  theology.  Man,  as  an  intel- 
lectual, moral,  and  religious  being,  does  not  attain  the 
end  of  his  existence  on  earth.  His  development  is  im- 
perfect here.  Will  divine  wisdom  leave  its-  work  in- 
complete ?  Must  there  not  be  a  hereafter,  for  the  full 
growth  of  man's  powers,  and  for  the  satisfaction  of  his 
aspirations?  Created,  unlike  the  brute,  with  infinite 
capacities  for  moral  progress,  must  there  not  be  an 
immortal  existence  in  which  those  capacities  shall  be 
brought  into  exercise  ?  Surely  we  have  here  an  argu- 
ment from  God's  love  and  wisdom  for  the  immortality 
of  the  righteous.  God  will  not  treat  the  righteous  as 
the  tyrant  of  Florence  treated  Michelangelo,  when 
he  bade  him  carve  out  of  ice  a  statue,  which  would 
melt  under  the  first  rays  of  the  sun.  Lanier  died  with 


418  BEYOND   THE    SHADOW    OF    OUR    NIGHT 

a  thousand  songs  -singing  in  his  soul;  his  head  and 
heart  were  full  of  poems.  Is  all  that  wealth  to  go  for 
naught?  We  can  only  point  to  the  poet's  own  un- 
wavering assurance  of  the  life  to  come,  and  to  the 
promises  of  the  Christ  in  whom  he  trusted,  to  answer 
the  gloomy  assertion  that  death  ends  all.  Reason 
may  not  enable  us  to  predict  a  certain  and  personal 
immortality.  But  Christ  has  "  brought  life  and  im- 
mortality to  light "  in  his  blessed  gospel ;  and  what 
reason  cannot  prove,  He  proves  who  rose  himself  from 
the  dead,  and  so  conquered  death  forevermore.  The 
end  of  Lanier  was  very  different  from  the  end  of 
Poe.  While  Poe's  life  ended  in  darkness  and  despair, 
Lanier's  ended  in  hope  and  joy.  To  Lanier  we  may 
apply  without  qualification  Shelley's  triumphant  words 
with  regard  to  Keats : 

"He  has  outsoared  the  shadow  of  our  night; 
Envy  and  calumny,  and  hate  and  pain, 
And  that  unrest  which  men  miscall  delight, 
Can  touch  him  not  and  torture  not  again; 
From  the  contagion  of  the  world's  slow  stain 
He  is  secure,  and  now  can  never  mourn 
A  heart  grown  cold,  a  head  grown  gray  in  vain. 


He  lives,  he  wakes — 'tis  Death  is  dead,  not  he; 
Mourn  not  for  Adonais!" 


IX 

WALT  WHITMAN 


"  Man  might  live  at  first 
The  animal  life:  but  is  there  nothing  more? 
In  due  time,  let  him  critically  learn 
How  he  lives;  and,  the  more  he  gets  to  know 
Of  his  own  life's  adaptabilities, 
The  more  joy-giving  will  his  life  become. 
Thus  man,  who  hath  this  quality,  is  best." 

— Browning's  "  Clean.' 


NOTE.  The  figures  appended  to  extracts  from  Whitman's 
poems  refer  to  pages  in  the  most  complete  and  critical  edition 
of  the  "  Leaves  of  Grass  "  hitherto  published — that  of  David 
McKay,  Philadelphia,  to  whom  the  author  gives  thanks  for 
the  privilege  of  transcription. 


WALT  WHITMAN 


SYDNEY  SMITH  once  observed  that,  when  he  had  a 
cold,  he  was  uncertain  whether  there  we're  thirty-nine 
Muses  and  nine  Articles,  or  nine  Muses  and  thirty- 
nine  Articles.  The  present  writer  has  no  cold,  but  he 
is  in  an  analogous  state  of  uncertainty.  In  a  previous 
work,  "  The  Great  Poets  and  Their  Theology,"  he 
found  nine  great  poets  to  correspond  with  the  nine 
Muses,  and  they  were  Homer,  Vergil,  Dante,  Shakes- 
peare, Milton,  Goethe,  Wordsworth,  Browning,  and 
Tennyson.  In  writing  on  "  American  Poets  and  Their 
Theology,"  he  would  like  also  to  find  nine  American 
poets  to  admire  and  to  criticize.  But  thus  far  there 
are  only  eight:  namely,  Bryant,  Emerson,  Whittier, 
Poe,  Longfellow,  Lowell,  Holmes,  and  Lanier.  Who 
shall  be  the  ninth?  A  large  majority  of  his  readers 
will  probably  answer  by  naming  Whitman.  Is  the 
vox  populi,  in  this  case,  a  vox  Dei?  The  future  of 
American  poetry  will  largely  depend  upon  our  conclu- 
sion; for  "like  people,  like  poet"  is  just  as  true  as 
"  like  people,  like  priest."  For  this  reason  I  wish  to 
weigh  Whitman's  life  and  work  in  absolutely  just 
balances,  even  though  adverse  criticism  may  be  at- 
tributed to  overplus  of  "  malignant  virtue "  in  the 
reviewer. 

The  choice  of  the  nickname  "  Walt  "  was  character- 
istic of  the  man.  He  rebelled  against  his  patronymic 

421 


422  WHITMAN  S    REVOLT    AGAINST    LAW 

"  Walter,"  as  too  formal  and  too  stiff.  He  wished  to 
be  unlike  his  father,  who  was  a  steady  and  somber 
man.  But  he  also  wished  to  be  unconventional  in  all 
his  ways.  The  "  hail-fellow-well-met,"  of  low  life, 
seemed  to  him  more  comradelike  and  more  humane 
than  the  elegant  gentlemen  who  bore  the  names  of  Sir 
Walter  Raleigh  and  Sir  Walter  Scott.  ^Revolt  against 
.tradition,  or  restriction,  or  law  of  any  sort,  unless  it 
were  the  law  of  his  own  impulses,  was  a  part  of  his 
nature.  He  desired  to  be  an  original  force  in  literature 
and  in  life.  His  poetical  works  begin  with  a  declara- 
tion of  independence  which  gives  us  a  valuable  clue 
to  their  total  significance: 

One's-Self  I  sing, — a  simple,  separate  Person; 

Yet  utter  the  word  Democratic,  the  word  En-masse. 

Of  Physiology  from  top  to  toe  I  sing; 
Not  physiognomy  alone,  nor  brain  alone,  is  worthy 
for  the  muse 

— I  say  the  Form  complete  is  worthier  far; 
The  Female  equally  with  the  male  I  sing. 

Of  Life  immense  in  passion,  pulse,  and  power, 
Cheerful — for  freest  action  form'd,  under  the  laws 

divine, 
The  Modern  Man  I  sing,  (n) 

Walt  Whitman  may  properly  be  considered  from 
three  points  of  view — his  art,  his  morality,  and  his 
religion.  In  his  art,  he  aims  to  .get  back  to  Nature. 
And  here  there  is  a  grain  of  truth.  Wordsworth  said 
well  that 

"  To  the  solid  ground  of  Nature  trusts  the  mind 
That  builds  for  aye." 


ART    WITHOUT    MORALITY    IMPOSSIBLE  423 

But  Nature  is  an  ambiguous  term.  Shall  we  confine 
it  to  the  physical  world,  and  make  poetry  merely  de- 
scriptive of  sunsets  and  storms?  There  is  no  poetry 
that  does  not  find  meanings  in  the  outward  world — 
suggestions  of  truth  and  beauty.  Shall  we  include 
man  in  Nature,  but  only  man's  body?  Then  we  forget 
that  body  has  no  value  or  claim  upon  our  attention 
except  as  it  serves  the  higher  uses  of  the  soul.  Poetry 
must  recognize  the  relation  of  man's  body  to  his  spirit, 
of  his  spirit  to  its  fellows,  and  of  all  men  to  God,  or 
it  will  be  destitute  of  beauty  and  of  truth.  An  all- 
embracing  atheism  and  materialism  cuts  poetry  loose 
from  its  real  sources  of  inspiration.  Nature  finds  its 
meanings  only  in  man,  and  man  finds  his  meanings 
only  in  God.  Art  without  morality,  and  morality  with- 
out religion,  are  equally  impossible.  -^Poetry  aims  to 
depict,  not  the  conceptions  of  savage  men,  but  those 
of  thoughtful  and  cultivated  men.  The  gentleman  and 
the  Christian  show  what  man's  nature  really  is.  Not 
the  body,  but  the  soul  that  dominates  the  body,  is  most 
worthy  of  admiration.  If  poetry  does  not  see  the 
higher  in  the  lower,  it  degrades  and  pollutes.  Art 
must  idealize,  or  perish. 

Bernard  Shaw  tells  us  that  the  great  ethical  move- 
ment of  our  day  is  the  turkey-trot.  In  a  similar  vein 
we  may  say  that  the  great  esthetic  movement  of  our 
day  is  free-verse.  *  Free-verse  is  destitute  of  rhyme, 
and  it  has  only  an  irregular  and  rudimental  rhythm. 
Walt  Whitman  is  its  leading  representative.  That 
poetry  may  take  the  form  of  free-verse  may  be 
granted,  while  yet  it  is  denied  that  Walt  Whitman's 
free-verse  is  poetry,  or,  if  poetry  at  all,  is  more  than 


4^4       FAITH    IN    GOD    NECESSARY    TO    GREAT    POETRY 

an  infantile  and  undeveloped  kind  of  poetry.  The 
free-verse  of  the  Ninetieth  Psalm,  like  some  of  the 
Ossianic  ballads,  has  other  merits  besides  that  of  free- 
dom. It  reproduces  Nature,  not  only  in  its  variety, 
but  also  in  its  ideal  aspects.  Those  ideal  aspects  are 
suggested  and  symbolized  in  the  measured  cadence  of 
Milton's  "  Paradise  Lost,"  and  in  every  worthy  speci- 
men of  blank  verse.  ^Poetry  is  an  expression  of  ide^l 
truth  in  its  normal  relations,  and  especially  in  its  sub- 
ordination of  the  physical  to  the  spiritual.  It  must 
recognize  the  moral  element  in  man.  Hence  the  glori- 
fication of  bodily  organs  and  passions,  and  the  as- 
sumption that  the  soul  is  a  mere  efflux  from  the  body, 
are  fatal  to  the  poet's  art  and  influence.  Man  is  not 
supreme  in  the  universe.  God  is  not  a  mere  name 
for  the  All.  There  is  a  higher  Personality  than  that 
of  the  poet,  and  a  theistic  faith  is  necessary  to  the 
greatest  poetry.  Evolution  builds  on  the  past.  It  is 
no  merit  to  be  wholly  unlike.  When  the  moral  element 
is  lacking,  egotism  leads  the  writer  to  overestimate 
his  own  powers  and  to  regard  all  his  observations  as 
of  equal  value.  All  things  become  divine,  and  he 
praises  the  vile  as  well  as  the  worthy.  The  world 
becomes  a  wilderness  of  rubbish,  which  he  merely 
inventories.  In  his  view,  man  becomes  free,  not  by 
entering  into  the  communion  and  life  of  the  personal 
God,  but  by  asserting  the  right  of  every  vicious  im- 
pulse to  control  his  action.  This  is  moral  slavery  and 
ruin,  and  this  is  the  philosophy  which  underlies  the 
•  verse  of  Walt  Whitman. 

Before  proceeding  to  verify  these   statements  by 
excerpts  from  his  writings,  it  will  be  well  to  glance 


FORMATIVE  INFLUENCES  OF  WHITMAN'S  BOYHOOD  425 

at  the  facts  of  his  life,  and,  if  possible,  to  discover 
the  sources  of  his  philosophy.  He  was  born  in  the 
township  of  Huntington,  on  the  northwestern  corner 
of  Long  Island,  on  May  31,  1819.  His  birthplace 
was  more  closely  connected  with  the  opposite  Con- 
necticut shore,  only  ten  miles  away,  than  it  was  with 
the  growing  village  of  Brooklyn,  forty  miles  to  the 
west.  From  Connecticut  had  come  the  mingled  En- 
glish, Independent,  and  Quaker  stock,  which  found  its 
unique  expression  in  himself.  When  he  was  only 
four  years  of  age,  however,  his  father  removed  to 
Brooklyn,  and  there  pursued  the  trade  of  a  master- 
carpenter.  But  the  boy  frequently  visited  his  grand- 
mother at  the  old  'home.  There  he  gathered  the  eggs 
of  sea-gulls  and  speared  eels.  In-  the  admirable  biog- 
raphy by  George  Rice  Carpenter,  these  surroundings 
are  credited  with  an  important  influence  upon  his 
mental  development :  "  The  poetic  gift  was  born  in 
him  when  he  listened  to  the  song  of  the  bird  calling 
its  dead  mate,  and  heard  the  melodious  hissing  of  the 
sea  whispering  of  death."  An  element  of  romance  was 
added  by  the  farmers  who  occasionally  dug  in  the 
beach  for  Captain  Cook's  treasures,  and  by  the  talks 
of  the  seamen  who  had  manned  our  ships  in  the  war 
of  1812. 

He  w'as  a  sturdy  child,  bred  by  his  father  to  the  car- 
penter's bench,  and  possessed  of  but  two  educational 
advantages,  the  district  school  and  the  circulating 
library.  The  "  Thousand  and  One  Nights  "  and  the 
"  Waverley  Novels  "  absorbed  him.  At  twelve  he  be- 
came office-boy  to  a  kind-hearted  lawyer,  then  similarly 
served  a  physician.  He  had  no  ambition  for  college. 

2D 


426  WHITMAN    A    BORN    BOHEMIAN 

His  real  training  was  that  of  a  printer's  apprentice 
and  of  a  school-teacher.  Experience  as  a  compositor 
led  to  sundry  contributions  to  the  "  Long  Island 
Patriot "  and  to  George  P.  Morris's  "  Mirror "  in 
New  York  City;  and  his  service  as  a  country  peda- 
gogue at  Babylon,  on  the  southern  shore  of  Long 
Island,  gave  him  some  practice  as  a  debater  and  public 
speaker.  He  was  at  that  time  an  abolitionist,  a  tee- 
totaler, an  opponent  of  capital  punishment.  He  was 
also  a  Democrat;  he  entered  the  realm  of  politics, 
advocated  the  election  of  Van  Buren  to  the  Presidency, 
stood  for  Free-Soil  and  Reform. 

After  1841  he  was  typesetter,  contributor,  editor, 
in  turn,  of  various  ephemeral  periodicals,  and  ended 
by  serving  on  the  staff  of  the  Brooklyn  "  Daily  Eagle." 
For  a  while  his  dress,  betokened  social  aspirations,  for 
he  wore  frock-coat,  tall  hat,  and  boutonniere.  -tent 
he  was  a  born  Bohemian,  and  society  irked  him.  He 
rebelled  against  authority  and  self-sacrifice.  He  spoke 
of  himself  as  "  stubborn,  restless,  and  unhappy."  He 
was  too  self-centered  easily  to  find  companionship,  and 
he  took  to  solitude,  assumed  the  dress  of  a  workman, 
and  sought  relief  by  wandering.  "  Lazy  and  hazy," 
he  spent  a  couple  of  years  in  travel,  if  so  we  may 
call  working  his  way  through  the  South.  In  my 
judgment,  this  tour  constituted  an  epoch  in  his  life, 
and  for  this  reason  I  shall  speak  more  fully  about  it 
hereafter,  and  shall  seek  further  light  upon  it  from 
his  writings.  In  the  meantime,  let  me  only  say  that 
he  was  for  a  brief  period  an  editor  on  the  staff  of  the 
New  Orleans  "  Crescent,"  and  that  after  a  few  months 
of  such  service  he  made  his  way  homeward  by  way  of 


GENESIS    OF    WHITMAN  S   GENIUS  427 

Chicago  and  the  Great  Lakes,  though  carrying  with 
him  affectionate  remembrances  of  the  "  exquisite 
wines,"  the  "  perfect  and  mild  French  brandy,"  the 
"  splendid  and  roomy  and  leisurely  barrooms  "  of  the 
St.  Charles  and  St.  Louis  hotels. 

In  1848  either  satiety  or  poverty  compelled  him  to 
return  to  his  father's  house  in  Brooklyn.  He  was  now 
thirty  years  of  age.  He  spent  several  years  in  assisting 
his  father's  work  of  carpentry  and  building.  But  all  the 
while  he  was  meditating  and  writing.  He  was  seized 
with  the  ambition  to-  put  his  experience  into  literature, 
and  into  literature  of  a  new  sort.  Between  1850  and 
1855  a  great  change  occurred.  Until  he  reached  the  age 
of  thirty-one  he  had  been  a  mere  writer  for  newspapers. 
After  this  time  he  was  a  writer  of  verse,  so  unusual  in 
form  and  so  strange  in  spirit  that  it  attracted  atten- 
tion and  criticism.  The  genesis  of  Walt  Whitman's 
peculiar  genius  has  occupied  the  inquiries  of  many 
biographers,  but  with  little  of  positive  result.  William 
Blake,  William  Wordsworth,  and  Samuel  Warren  are 
said  to  have  given  him  hints.  More  weight  may  be 
attributed  to  the  suggestion  that  without  Whitman's 
knowledge  of  the  English  Bible,  its  Old  Testament 
parallelism  and  accompanying  rhythm,  he  never  would 
have  devised  his  method.  But  it  was  substance  rather 
than  form  that  he  thought  most  of.  He  wished  to  be 
the  poet  of  the  crowd,  the  mouthpiece  of  primitive 
humanity,  the  expression  of  man's  physical  nature. 
With  this  view,  in  1855,  he  gave  up  manual  work,  and 
devoted  himself  to  literature,  so  far  as  an  indolent 
resignation  of  himself  to  observation  and  to  writing 
could  accomplish  this. 


428      HICKS   AND    EMERSON    SOURCES    OF    WHITMAN 

There  were  two  sources  of  his  philosophy.  Not 
enough  attention  has  been  given  by  his  biographers 
to  the  strain  of  Quaker  blood  in  his  veins,  and  to  the 
influence  of  Quakerism  upon  his  early  religious  thought 
and  life.  The  Van  Velsors,  from  whom  he  sprang  on 
his  mother's  side,  were  of  Quaker  ancestry.  But  his 
grandfather  was  a  friend  and  comrade  of  Elias  Hicks, 
the  Quaker  preacher,  who  began  the  movement  against 
the  orthodox  beliefs,  of  George  Fox,  and  became  the 
head  and  leader  of  the  sect  called  Hicksites.  Whittier 
stood  by  the  old  faith ;  but  Hicks  gave  up  the  deity  of 
Christ  and  the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures.  In  Hicks 
there  was  a  spirit  of  revolt  and  self-assertion  that  was 
lacking  in  the  older  body.  All  mere  forms  of  religion, 
even  churchgoing  and  public  prayer,  were  made  little 
of.  And  Walt  Whitman  was  brought  up  in  an  atmos- 
phere of  shrewd  worldliness  which  placed  dependence 
solely  upon  the  inward  light — an  inward  light  which, 
in  his  case,  showed  its  insufficiency,  apart  from  the 
Christian  revelation,  as  a  guide  to  belief  or  conduct. 

The  second  influence  which  shaped  the  philosophy 
of  Walt  Whitman  was  more  immediate  than  that  of 
Elias  Hicks;  it  was1  that  of  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson. 
A  newspaper  reviewer,  soon  after  the  publication  of 
Whitman's  great  work,  the  "  Leaves  of  Grass,"  de- 
scribed it  as  the  production  of  both  a  transcendentalist 
and  a  rowdy.  About  the  transcendentalism  there  can 
be  no  doubt,  and  to  my  mind  it  is  equally  clear  that 
this,  was  mainly  derived  from  Emerson.  If  the  reader 
is  surprised  at  this,  or  inclined  to  doubt,  I  would  refer 
him  to  my  exposition  of  Emerson's  philosophy  in  a 
preceding  essay  of  this  volume.  In  these  early  days 


"  LEAVES    OF   GRASS  "  42Q 

Whitman  went  about  everywhere  with  a  copy  of  Em- 
erson's "  Essays  "  in  his  pocket.  He  called  Emerson 
his  master,  and  Emerson  himself  recognized  in  Whit- 
man the  same  ideas  of  which  he  alone  had  been  thus 
far  the  advocate,  remarking-  pleasantly  that  "Leaves 
of  Grass  "  was  a  combination  of  the  Bhagavad  Gita 
and  the  New  York  "  Herald."  Whitman's  disjointed 
and  rhapsodic  method  of  utterance,  both  in  prose  and 
in  poetry,  was  possibly  caught  from  Emerson,  together 
with  his  fundamental  conceptions  that  Nature  is  orig- 
inally and  mainly  physical,  that  spirit  is  an  efflux  from 
matter,  and  that  mind  is-  to  be  interpreted  in  bodily 
terms.  A  materialistic,  deterministic,  and  fatalistic 
philosophy  pervades  all  of  Whitman's  writing.  It  is 
the  glaring  but  natural  outcome  of  Emerson's  more 
guarded  but  none  the  less  pernicious  doctrine.  This 
philosophy  is  the  secret  of  Whitman's  glorification  of 
man's  physical  nature,  and  it  makes  "  Leaves  of  Grass  " 
little  more  than  the  history  of  his  own  body.  That 
body  he  conceives  to  be  only  a  significant  part  of  the 
vast  universe,  of  which  good  and  evil  are  alike  and 
equally  the  manifestations.  The  poet  is  a  part  of  the 
All — he  is  indeed  the  soul  of  the  All — worthy  of  ad- 
miration therefore  in  all  his  impulses  and  powers. 
Whitman  is  a  pantheist  like  the  Brahman,  and  he  can 
sing  the  praises  of  lust,  as  the  Hindu  carves  its  doings 
in  the  Caves  of  Elephanta. 

The  publication  of  "  Leaves  of  Grass  "  was  unques- 
tionably the  advent  of  a  novelty  in  American  litera- 
ture. Until  1855  Whitman  had  been  content  with 
prose.  But  desire  for  independence  grew  by  what  it 
fed  on.  Wanderlust,  at  first  a  physical  instinct,  be- 


430    EMERSON'S  CRITICISM  OF  "  LEAVES  OF  GRASS  " 

came  at  last  consciously  intellectual.  Freedom  became 
a  passion,  and  asserted  itself  in-  his.  writing-.  Every 
great  passion  tends  to  rhythmical  expression.  Abraham 
Lincoln's  address  at  Gettysburg  may  be  put  into  lines 
that  read  like  poetry.  In  his  Southern  tour  Whitman 
had  given  such  rein  to  impulse  that  he  came  to  re- 
gard all  impulse  as  divine.  He  felt  himself  surcharged 
with  elemental  forces  that  had  hitherto  no  proper  out- 
let in  literature.  He  wished  to  voice  the  humanity  and 
energy  of  the  illiterate  horde  with  which  he  identified 
himself — he  would  represent,  not  the  world  of  books, 
but  the  world  of  men.  He  would  make  his  verse  con- 
form to  his  subject:  he  spoke  of  his  poems  as 

lawless  at  first  perusal,  although  on  closer  examination  a  cer- 
tain regularity  appears,  like  the  recurrence  of  lesser  and 
larger  waves  on  the  seashore,  rolling  in  without  intermis- 
sion, and  fitfully  rising  and  falling. 

Emerson  did  much  to  commend  "  Leaves  of  Grass  " 
to  the  general  public.  He  called  it  "  the  most  extraor- 
dinary piece  of  wit  and  wisdom  that  America  has  yet 
contributed."  Whitman  says  of  Emerson's  letter  con- 
veying this  eulogium,  "  I  regarded  it  as  the  charter  of 
an  Emperor."  This  was  only  natural,  since  Whitman 
was  the  inheritor  of  Emerson's  philosophy,  if  not  of 
his  delicacy  or  of  his  style.  But  Emerson  greatly  ob- 
jected to  the  publication  of  his  private  letter,  and  he 
afterward  added  criticisms  which  seemed  like  confes- 
sions of  regret  for  his  premature  enthusiasm.  For 
Whitman  was  no  blind  or  passive  admirer,  but  one 
determined  to  carry  Emerson's  philosophy  to  its  logical 
conclusion.  In  a  long  talk  with  Whitman  on  Boston 


WHITMAN    UNCHANGED    BY    CRITICISM  43! 

Common,  Emerson  sought  to  convince  him  that  rhyme 
and  rhythm  are  not  unnatural,  and  that  reticence  with 
regard  to  some  bodily  relations  is  consistent  with  ideal 
truth.  Whitman  was  unconvinced,  though  somewhat 
impressed  by  the  words  of  his  master.  He  could 
write  with  unusual  humility : 

Whether  my  friends  claim  it  for  me  or  not,  I  know  well 
enough  that  in  respect  to  pictorial  talent,  dramatic  situa- 
tions, and  especially  in  verbal  melody  and  all  the  conven- 
tional technique  of  poetry,  not  only  the  divine  works  that 
to-day  stand  ahead  in  the  world's  reading,  but  dozens  more, 
transcend  (some  of  them  immeasurably  transcend)  all  I  have 
done  or  could  do. 

But  he  also  wrote  a  eulogy  of  Emerson  which  served 
for  self- justification: 

His  final  influence  is  to  make  his  students  cease  to  worship 
anything — almost  cease  to  believe  in  anything,  outside  of 
themselves.  .  .  No  teacher  ever  taught,  that  has  so  provided 
for  his  pupil's  setting  up  independently — no  truer  evolutionist. 

He  came  at  last  to  depreciate  his  benefactor.  In  1872 
he  wrote : 

Emerson  has  just  been  this  way  .  .  .  lecturing.  He  main- 
tains the  same  attitude — draws  on  the  same  themes — as 
twenty-five  years  ago.  It  all  seems  to-  me  quite  attenuated 
(the  first  drawing  of  a  good  pot  of  tea,  you  know,  and  Emer- 
son's was  the  heavenly  herb  itself — but  what  must  one  say  to 
a  second,  or  even  third  or  fourth  infusion?) 

And  the  result  of  Emerson's  criticism,  like  the  opposi- 
tion of  other  critics,  was  only  to  confirm  the  poet  in 
his  chosen  method.  So.  he  writes : 

When  the  book  aroused  such  a  storm  of  anger  and  cordem- 
nation  everywhere,  I  went  off  to  the  East  end  of  Long  Island 


432  A    POET    OF    CHAOS 

and  Peconic  Bay.  Then  came  back  to  New  York  with  the 
confirmed  resolution,  from  which  I  never  afterwards  wavered, 
to  go  on  with  my  poetic  enterprise  in  my  own  way,  and 
finish  it  as  well  as  I  could. 

Whitman's  aims  and  methods  were  certainly  original. 
In  notes  which  he  left  at  his  death,  he  charged  himself : 

Make  no  quotations,  and  no  reference  to  other  writers. 
Lumber  the  writing  with  nothing — let  it  go  as  lightly  as  the 
bird  flies  in  the  air  or  a  fish  swims  in  the  sea.  Avoid  all  poet- 
ical similes;  be  faithful  to  the  perfect  likelihoods  of  nature — • 
healthy,  exact,  simple,  disdaining  ornaments.  Do  not  go  into 
criticisms  or  arguments  at  all;  make  full-blooded,  rich,  flush, 
natural  works.  Insert  natural  things,  indestructibles,  idioms, 
characteristics,  rivers,  states,  persons,  and  so  forth.  Be  full 
of  strong  sensual  germs!  .  .  Poet!  beware  lest  your  poems  are 
made  in  the  spirit  that  comes  from  the  study  of  pictures  of 
things — and  not  from  the  spirit  that  comes  from  the  con- 
tact with  real  things  themselves. 

Emerson's  later  judgments  with  regard  to  Whitman 
were,  as  I  have  already  intimated,  less  favorable  than 
were  his  earlier  utterances.  He  calls  Whitman's  cata- 
logues of  natural  objects  "  the  auctioneer's  inventories 
of  a  warehouse."  The  poet  mistook  these  for  poetry, 
whereas  they  were  simply  materials  for  poetry.  His 
philosophy  spoiled  his  art  If  Whitman  was  a  poet  at 
all,  he  was  a  poet  of  chaos,  for  his  work  is  "  without 
form  and  void  " ;  the  creative  and  shaping  hand  is  lack- 
ing. He  does  not  perceive  that  art  is  not  merely  the 
copyist  of  nature,  but  the  copyist  of  the  higher  nature, 
the  discoverer  of  the  unifying  principle  of  nature,  the 
revelation  of  the  spiritual  and  moral  Author  and  End 
of  nature.  Since  Whitman  would  not  recognize  the 
God  of  nature,  he  could  see  nature  only  in  bits.  He 


PANTHEISTIC    PHILOSOPHY    A    FOE    OF    ART       433 

was  "  hypnotized  by  phenomena  " ;  like  Yankee  Doodle, 
he  "  could  not  see  the  town,  there  were  so  many 
houses."  This  is  the  real  explanation  of  his  weari- 
some cataloguing,  which  often  runs  into  a  maundering 
vacuity.  It  also  accounts  for  his  eulogy  of  the  mean 
and  the  low,  the  vulgar  and  the  vile.  He  has  no  sense 
of  proportion,  because  lie  has  no  proper  standard  of 
judgment.  He  forgets  that  nature  is  man's  garden, 
a  garden  not  perfect,  but  one  which  man  is  to  dress 
and  keep.  Poetry  sees  the  ideal  thought  in  nature  and 
reproduces  it  in  verse.  To  fancy  that  the  ugly  and 
the  vicious  are  divine,  that  one  man  is  as  good  as  an- 
other, merely  because  both  are  found  in  the  world,  is 
to  make  real  poetry  impossible. 

This  same  philosophy  degrades  the  form  of  art  as 
well  as  its  substance.  Beauty  wakens  in  us  sym- 
pathetic feeling,  and  clamors  for  rhythmical  expres- 
sion. The  poet  thinks  instinctively  in  numbers — the 
numbers  indeed  are  born  with  the  thought.  The  high- 
est truth  clothes  itself  in  melodious  phrase.  Great 
poets  are  great  artists  as  well  as  great  lovers  of 
truth.  As  the  sense  of  beauty  and  of  truth  becomes 
more  acute,  poetry  becomes  more  rhythmical  and  more 
melodious.  Recitative  gives  place  to  song.  Walt 
Whitman  scouts  these  higher  modes  of  expression, 
and  imitates  only  the  voices  of  physical  and  animal 
nature.  But  in  doing  this  he  descends  to  the  lower 
methods  of  aboriginal  man,  and,  to  adopt  his  own 
phrase,  "  sends  over  the  roofs  of  the  world  only  a 
barbaric  yawp."  We  might  as  well  give  up  Handel 
and  Beethoven,  and  go  back  to  the  music  of  tom-toms. 
The  lower  form  of  poetry  indicates  a  lower  form  of 


434  "°  CAPTAIN!  MY  CAPTAIN!" 

truth,  and  copies  only  a  lower  form  of  nature.  In  my 
judgment,  Whitman's  best  poems,  the  "  Song  of  the 
Universal,"  the  "  Proud  Music  of  the  Storm,"  the 
"  Song  of  the  Redwood  Tree,"  the  "  Song  of  the 
Exposition,"  and,  above  all,  "  O  Captain !  my  Cap- 
tain !  "  are  those  in  which  he  comes  nearest  to  the 
conventional  forms  of  poetical  expression,  most  nearly 
forgets  his  dogmas  of  the  body,  and  most  avails  him- 
self of  the  garnered  wisdom  of  the  past. 

Before  I  pass  from  the  consideration  of  the  mere 
form  of  Whitman's  verse,  I  must  quote  his  greatest 
poem,  if  only  to  show  how  near  he  came  to  achieving 
both  technical  and  emotional  success.  "  O  Captain ! 
my  Captain !  "  will  live,  when  all  else  that  he  has 
written  is  forgotten.  Better  than  any  other  poem, 
it  expresses  the  universal  sorrow  which  followed  the 
death  of  our  martyred  President,  Abraham  Lincoln  : 

O  Captain!  my  Captain!  our  fearful  trip  is  done; 

The  ship  has  weather'd  every  rack,  the  prize  we  sought  is 

won; 

The  port  is  near,  the  bells  I  hear,  the  people  all  exulting, 
While  follow  eyes  the  steady  keel,  the  vessel  grim  and  daring: 
But  O  heart!  heart!  heart! 
O  the  bleeding  drops  of  red, 
Where  on  the  deck  my  Captain  lies, 
Fallen  cold  and  dead. 

O  Captain!  my  Captain!  rise  up  and  hear  the  bells; 

Rise  up — for  you  the  flag  is  flung — for  you  the  bugle  trills; 

For  you  bouquets  and  ribbon'd  wreaths — for  you  the  shores 

a-crowding; 

For  you  they  call,  the  swaying  mass,  their  eager  faces  turning; 
Here  Captain!  dear  father! 

This  arm  beneath  your  head; 

It  is  some  dream  that  on  the  deck 
You've  fallen  cold  and  dead. 


WHITMAN'S  EGOTISM  435 

My  Captain  does  not  answer,  his  lips  are  pale  and  still; 
My  father  does  not  feel  my  arm,  he  has  no  pulse  nor  will; 
The  ship  is  anchor'd  safe  and  sound,  its  voyage  closed  and 

done; 

From  fearful  trip,  the  victor  ship,  comes  in  with  object  won: 
Exult,  O  shores,  and  ring,  O  bells! 
But  I,  with  mournful  tread, 

Walk  the  deck  my  Captain  lies, 
Fallen  cold  and  dead.  (375) 

Here  is  genuine  emotion,  but  emotion  clothed  in  nearly 
correct  metrical  form.  It  shows  that  Whitman  could 
write  poetry  when  his  soul  was  stirred  by  something 
outside  himself.  There  are  defects  even  here  which 
it  were  ungracious  to  criticize,  but  they  are  all  defects 
due  to  his  method,  and  we  lose  sight  of  them  when  we 
enter  sympathetically  into  his  grief  over  the  unspeak- 
able  loss  which  the  nation  suffered  when  its  great 
Captain  died.  Unfortunately,  with  all  its  occasional 
flashes  of  genius,  his  free-verse  is  ordinarily  not  so 
near  the  requirements  of  poetry  as  is  some  of  his 
prose.  Its  art  is  infantile  and  defective;  it  is  indolent 
and  often  commonplace;  the  most  remarkable  thing 
about  it  is  that  it  was  ever  printed  as  poetry. 

Another  infelicity  clings  to  Walt  Whitman's  art; 
namely,  his  boundless  egotism.  This  too  is  the  fruit 
of  his  philosophy.  He  is  possessed  by  the  pantheistic 
delusion  that  the  universe  reaches  personality  only  in 
man.  He  himself  is  the  typical  manifestation  of  the 
universe  and  its  typical  representative.  Every  atom 
of  his  body  and  every  thought  of  his  mind  is  there- 
fore of  value.  The  complete  expression  of  himself 
will  be  the  exposition  of  universal  humanity.  He  criti- 
cized Ruskin's  view  that  poetry  should  have 


436       A   SENSE    OF    SIN    WANTING    IN    WHITMAN 

nothing  to  do  with  the  poet's  special  personality,  nor  exhibit 
the  least  trace  of  it — like  Shakspere's  great  unsurpassable 
dramas.  But  I  have  dashed  at  the  greater  drama  going  on 
within  myself  and  every  human  being — that  is  what  I  have  been 
after. 

Homer,  Vergil,  and  Dante  have  been  reticent  about 
themselves;  we  know  little  about  them;  their  poetry 
is  objective  rather  than  subjective.  Whitman  would 
reverse  all  this;  he  says  unblushingly,  "I  celebrate 
myself  " ;  he  would  express  in  his  verse  every  impulse 
of  his  nature.  This  naked  individualism  is  the  result 
of  self-deification.  And  this  naked  individualism,  in 
turn,  corrupted  his  art.  He  was  too  great  an  ad- 
mirer of  himself  to  be  conscious  of  his  own  defects  of 
style.  He  could  not  tell  the  commonplace  from  the 
inspired. 

Our  criticism  of  Whitman's  art  becomes  very  quickly 
a  criticism  of  his  morality.  His  blatant  egotism  is  the 
egotism  of  the  atheist  who  sees  nothing  in  the  universe 
higher  than  himself.  He  sees  no  divine  holiness  in 
contrast  with  his  own  moral  imperfection;  he  per- 
ceives no  moral  evil  in  himself,  and  so  is  blind  to  the 
greatness  of  the  good.  His  sense  of  sin  is  as  weak 
as  his  sense  of  God.  But  I  must  not  prematurely  con-1 
demn  him.  There  is  one  utterance  of  his  which  has 
been  quoted  in  his  favor.  In  his  letter  to  Edward 
Dowden,  dated  January  18,  1872,  he  describes  his 
aim  in  literature : 

I  seek  to  typify  living  Human  Personality,  immensely  ani- 
mal, with  immense  passions,  immense  amativeness,  immense 
adhesiveness — in  the  woman  immense  maternity — and  then,  in 
both,  immenser  far,  a  moral  conscience,  and  in  always  realizing 


THE    COARSE    EGO    IN    WHITMAN  S    VERSE          437 

the  direct  and  indirect  control  of  the  divine  laws  through  all 
and  over  all  forever. 

So  far  as  my  reading  of  his  works  informs  me,  this 
is  the  only  tribute  which  the  author  makes  to  morality, 
or  law,  or  God.  It  is  so  exceptional  a  tribute,  and  is 
so  incongruous  with  the  general  drift  and  spirit  of 
his  writings,  that  I  must  regard  it  as  a  tribute  to  his 
correspondent,  rather  than  to  the  great  realities  which 
his  poems  and  his  life  ignored.  As  we  shall  hereafter 
see,  the  poet  was  quite  capable  of  impersonating  a 
morality  which  he  did  not  possess,  in  order  that  he 
might  not  utterly  lose  the  good  opinion  of  his  friends. 
The  Whitman  cult  is  so  frequently  unacquainted 
with  his  poems  and  his  life,  that  duty  seems  to  require 
the  publication  of  features  in  both  which  eulogists 
have  hitherto  ignored.  It  is  a  thankless  and  unpleasing 
task,  and  I  undertake  it  with  regret.  I  proceed  to 
quote  certain  passages  of  his  verse,  in  which  egotism 
and  coarseness  are  evenly  matched : 

Walt  Whitman  am  I,  a  Kosmos,  of  mighty  Manhattan  the 

son, 

Turbulent,  fleshy  and  sensual,  eating,  drinking  and  breeding; 
No  sentimentalist — no  stander  above  men  and  women,  or 

apart  from  them; 
No  more  modest  than  immodest.  (54) 

Joy  of  the  friendly,  plenteous  dinner — the  strong  carouse, 
and  drinking! 

O,  while  I  live,  to  be  the  ruler  of  life — not  a  slave!  • 

To  be  indeed  a  God!  (384) 

Teacher  of  the  unquenchable  creed,  namely,  egotism.  (168) 


438  WHITMAN'S  THESIS 

I  know  perfectly  well  my  own  egotism; 

I  know  my  omnivorous  lines,  and  will  not  write  any  less; 

And  would  fetch  you,  whoever  you  are,  flush  with  myself.  (81) 

I  will  effuse  egotism,  and  show  it  underlying  all  —  and  I  will 

be  the  bard  of  personality; 
And  I  will  show  of  male  and  female  that  either  is  but  the 

equal  of  the  other; 
And  sexual  organs  and  acts!  do  you  concentrate  in  me  —  for 

I  am  determin'd  to  tell  you  with  courageous  clear  voice, 

to  prove  you  illustrious.  (24) 

Behold!  the  body  includes  and  is  the  meaning,  the  main 
concern  —  and  includes  and  is  the  Soul.  (25) 

I  swear  I  think  now  that  everything  without  exception  has  an 
eternal  Soul.  (391) 

I  believe  a  leaf  of  grass  is  no  less  than  the  journey-work  of 

the  stars; 
And  the  pismire  is  equally  perfect,  and  a  grain  of  sand,  and 

the  egg  of  the  wren.  (62) 

Unscrew  the  locks  from  the  doors! 

Unscrew  the  doors  themselves  from  their  jambs!  (54) 

Through  me  forbidden  voices; 

Voices  of  sexes  and  lusts  —  voices  veil'd,  and  I  remove  the 

veil; 
Voices  indecent,  by  me  clarified  and  transfigur'd.  (55) 

Fall  behind  me,  States! 

A  man  before  all  —  myself,  typical  before  all.  (303) 


divinity  of  the  common  man  was  Whitman's 
thesis,  and  that  for  the  reason  that  the  individual  sum- 
marizes and  expresses  the  universaj>  It  was  a  dim 
apprehension  of  the  universal,  without  recognition  of 
its  unifying-  principle,  Whitman  perceived  the  power 


A   MAN   WITHOUT   A   SHRINE  439 

that  works  in  and  through  nature,  but  failed  to  see  the 
personality  of  that  power.  He  chose  a  non-moral,  in- 
stead of  a  moral  God.  The  only  unifying  principle  he 
could  discern  was  himself.  So  he  could  believe  all  his 
ideas  and  passions  to  be  manifestations  of  the  in- 
dwelling Deity.  His  system  was  an  "  illegitimate  con- 
secration of  the  finite."  Good  and  evil  alike,  in  others 
as  well  as  in  himself,  were  revelations  of  the  spirit 
that  moved  through  all,  and  that  spirit  was  only  the 
personification  of  matter,  something  non-moral,  evil 
as  well  as  good.  He  liked  the  "  refreshing  wicked- 
ness "  of  stage-drivers  and  ferry-hands,  for  to  him,  in 
quite  other  than  the  scriptural  sense,  there  was  "  noth- 
ing common  or  unclean."  What  Emerson  said  of 
Gibbon  applies  equally  to  him :  "  The  man  has  no 
shrine — a  man's  most  important  possession."  Hence 
he  could  glorify  every  bodily  appetite,  and  make  even 
the  life  of  the  prostitute  a  subject  of  his  verse.  I  must 
connect  this  celebration  of  vileness  with  his  own  prac- 
tical cutting  loose  from  restraint.  He  would  not  have 
thus  deified  passion,  if  he  had  not  previously  broken 
away  from  a  personal  and  holy  God. 

As  to  Whitman's  immorality,  at  least  in  his  early 
life,  we  are  not  left  to  conjecture.  His  own  letter  to 
John  Addington  Symonds,  dated  August  10,  1890,  and 
written  in  his  seventy-second  year,  is  sufficiently  ex- 
plicit: 

My  life,  young  manhood,  mid-age,  times  South,  etc.,  have 
been  jolly  bodily,  and  doubtless  open  to  criticism.  Though 
unmarried  I  have  had  six  children — two  are  dead — one  living 
Southern  grandchild,  fine  boy,  writes  to  me  occasionally — 
circumstances  (connected  with  their  fortune  and  benefit) 
have  prevented  me  from  intimate  relations. 


44O  WHITMAN'S  IMMORALITY 

I  do  not  find  in  this,  or  in  any  other  writing  of  Walt 
Whitman,  the  least  sign  of  regret  for  the  "  jolly  life  " 
of  those  Southern  years,  or  for  the  subsequent  abandon- 
ment of  his  offspring.  His  paternity  was  like  that  of 
Rousseau,  which  permitted  his  own  children  to  be 
foundlings.  Bliss  Perry,  in  his  otherwise  comprehen- 
sive and  judicial  biography  of  Whitman,  has  minimized 
the  poet's  aberrations,  and  has  attributed  them  to  sud- 
den floods  of  passion  which  overtook  a  sensitive  nature 
and  served  as  an  early  stage  of  its  education.  Much 
as  I  should  like  to  accept  this  explanation,  it  seems 
to  me  inadequate,  in  view  of  two  outstanding  facts : 
first,  that  Whitman  never  expressed  regret  for  the 
escapades,  never  suppressed  or  retracted  what  have 
always  seemed  his  vicious  utterances;  and,  secondly, 
that,  with  regard  to  the  most  serious  suspicion  of  his 
correspondent,  Whitman  ventures  upon  no  direct  de- 
nials. Symonds  had  been  reading  "  Calamus,"  a  group 
of  poems  celebrating  the  intimate  friendship  of  men 
for  men.  Some  of  the  lines  troubled  him,  and,  as 
Perry  says : 

"  His  familiarity  with  certain  passages  of  Greek  literature 
increased  his  curiosity.  He  wrote  to  Whitman  begging  for  a 
more  exact  elucidation,  and  Whitman,  in  order  to  avoid  any 
possible  misconstruction,  wrote  frankly  in  reply  concerning 
his  own  early  relations  with  women." 

Yes,  but  he  said  nothing  about  his  early  relations  with 
men. 

Whitman  was  something  of  a  poseur.  His  urbanity 
and  dignity  were  at  times  the  veil  which  hid  an  inward 
sense  of  difference  between  his  own  standards  and  those 
accepted  by  the  world  around  him.  He  \vould  not 


WHITMAN    A    POSEUR  441 

argue,  and  he  would  not  disclose ;  but  he  could  ignore. 
So  he  went  steadily  on  his  way,  only  the  more  deter- 
mined by  criticism  to  live  his  own  life  and  maintain 
his  own  independence  of  all  ordinary  moral  as  well 
as  all  ordinary  literary  standards.  He  had  a  fine 
faculty  of  concealment,  but  he  was  also  capable  of 
arrant  dishonesty.  His  persistent  self-glorification  and 
occasional  falsification  of  facts  throw  doubt  upon  the 
sincerity  of  his  seeming  disclaimers.  Whitman  was 
not  only  guilty  of  indelicacy  in  sending  to  various  jour- 
nals extravagant  eulogies  of  his  own  poems,  but  he 
prefaced  his  "  Leaves-Droppings "  with  a  letter  to 
Emerson,  from  which  I  quote  the  following  sentences : 

The  first  edition,  on  which  you  mailed  me  that  till  now  un- 
answered letter,  was  twelve  poems — I  printed  a  thousand 
copies,  and  they  readily  sold;  these  thirty-two  Poems  I  stereo- 
type, to  print  several  thousand  copies  of.  .  .  The  way  is  clear 
to  me.  A  few  years,  and  the  average  annual  call  for  my 
Poems  is  ten  or  twenty  thousand  copies — more,  quite  likely. 

Mr.  Perry  tells  us,  however,  that,  of  the  "  Leaves  of 
Grass  "  of  1855, 

"An  edition  of  a  thousand  copies  was  planned,  but  only 
about  eight  hundred  seem  actually  to  have  been  printed.  .  . 
Then  came  the  tragedy  of  hope  deferred.  There  were  practi- 
cally no  sales.  In  his  old  age  Whitman  used  to  refer  good- 
naturedly  to  the  one  man  who  actually  bought  a  copy  of  the 
1855  edition." 

The  biographer  calls  the  letter  to  Emerson  a  "  ro- 
mancing about  the  sale  of  the  first  edition,"  and  speaks 
of 

"  Whitman's  nervous  condition  at  the  time.     He  was  over- 
excited,   no    doubt,   and   felt    that    he    was    playing   for    high 
stakes." 
2E 


442  THOREAU  S    SEARCHING    CRITICISM 

It  seems  to  me  rather  to  deserve  severe  censure,  as  a 
deliberate  attempt  to  deceive  the  man  who  had  first 
given  him  currency  and  credit  in  the  literary  world. 
Whitman's  appetite  for  praise  grew  by  what  it  fed  on ; 
self -appreciation  became  monumental;  it  lasted  to  the 
end ;  for,  long  after  admirers,  themselves  straitened  in 
means,  were  contributing  to  his  support  because  they 
believed  him  penniless,  he  was  erecting  for  himself  a 
mausoleum  which  cost  four  thousand  dollars,  and  at 
his  death  he  had  in  the  bank  several  thousand  dollars 
more.  "  The  good,  gray  poet  "  must  submit  to  some 
discount  of  his  pretensions. 

Late  in  life  Whitman  said  to  Prof.  G.  K.  Palmer: 
"  There  are  things  in  '  Leaves  of  Grass '  which  I 
would  no  sooner  write  now  than  I  would  cut  off  my 
right  hand;  but  I  am  glad  I  printed  them."  Whittier 
called  the  book  "  muck,  obscenity,  vulgarity,  bombast," 
and  he  threw  it  into  the  fire.  The  intensity  and  par- 
ticularity of  its  references  to  sensual  relations  dis- 
gusted him.  It  was  indeed  a  sort  of  phallic  frenzy. 
»Thoreau  praised  it  as  a  study  of  nature,  but  thought 
that  the  beasts  might  have  so  spoken.  That  was  a 
significant  and  searching  criticism.  Whitman  admired 
the  beasts.  He  said : 


I  think  I  could  go  and  live  with  the  animals.  I  stand  and 
look  at  them  long  and  long.  They  are  so  placid  and  self- 
contained.  They  do  not  fret  and  whine  about  their  condi- 
tion; they  do  not  lie  awake  in  the  dark  and  weep  for  their 
sins;  they  do  not  make  me  sick,  discussing  their  duty  to  God. 
Not  one  of  them  is  respectable  or  unhappy  over  the  whole 
earth.  What  blurt  is  this  about  virtue  and  about  vice?  .  . 
Evil  propels  me,  and  refusal  of  evil  propels  me;  I  am  indif- 
ferent. 


OBSCENITY    EXALTED   TO   A    PRINCIPLE  443 

Whitman's  rejection  of  a  holy  God  is  followed  by  a 
blinding  of  his  soul  to  sin.  And  of  this  it  has  been 
well  said,  "  The  man  who  lives  like  an  animal  and  cares 
not  for  moral  failure,  having  no  desire  for  things  noble 
or  great,  is  worse  than  an  animal,  because  he  is  so  much 
more  than  an  animal."  In  "  Leaves  of  Grass  "  Whit- 
man hints  indeed  at  physical  relations  and  contacts  of 
which  the  mere  animal  is  ignorant  and  guiltless,  and 
which  remind  the  reader  of  Oscar  Wilde. 

»What  is  the  truth  about  his  glorification  of  the  body  ? 
We  may  grant  that  there  is  a  squeamishness  which  is 
only  prudery.  Oversensitiveness  with  regard  to  bodily 
organs  is  a  sign  of  undisciplined  imagination.  Educa- 
tion gives  a  certain  freedom,  both  in  conversation  and 
in  plastic  art.  The  human  form  is  noble  and  divine, 
even  in  its  nudity.  But  only  when  immoral  suggestion 
is  wholly  absent,  and  when  form  suggests  the  su- 
premacy of  spirit.  In  other  words,  nature  in  this 
aspect  utters  a  symbolic  language,  and  is  beautiful  only 
when  she  is  moral;  when  she  is  immoral,  she  needs 
to  be  ashamed.  The  bodily  organs  and  relations  are 
worthy  of  reverence,  and  are  subjects  for  poetry,  only 
so  far  as  they  symbolize  spiritual  truth  and  minister 
to  its  influence.  To  make  the  body  in  itself  an  object 
of  worship,  or  to  regard  it  as  the  parent  and  master 
of  the  soul,  is  to  reverse  all  right  relations  and  to  teach 
a  fundamental  immorality.  Yet  this  is  the  doctrine 
of  Whitman.  His  poetry  is  a  poetry  of  the  flesh.  Ret- 
icence with  regard  to  sexual  relations  is  necessary  if 
we  would  recognize  the  rightful  reign  of  spirit  over 
body.  But  Whitman  has  exalted  obscenity  into  a 
principle. 


444  WHITMAN    PRAISED    BY    NOTED    MEN 

It  would  be  difficult  to  conceive  more  unblushing  an- 
nouncements of  immoral  ambition  than  are  contained 
in  some  of  his  poems.  The  Attorney  General  of 
Massachusetts  evidently  took  this  view  of  the  case 
when  he  threatened  to  prosecute  Whitman's  publishers 
for  printing  an  obscene  volume,  and  James  R.  Osgood 
and  Company  in  consequence  gave  up  the  publication 
of  the  "  Leaves  of  Grass."  Secretary  James  Harlan, 
in  Washington,  in  like  manner  dismissed  Whitman 
from  his  $1,600  clerkship  because  that  book  was  found 
in  his  possession.  But  the  poet  gained  stout  defenders 
Rossetti  declared  the  work  to  be  "  incomparably  the 
largest  performance  of  our  period  in  poetry,"  though 
he  objected  to  its  "  agglomeration."  William  Dean 
Howells  spoke  of  Whitman,  after  a  visit,  as  "  emanat- 
ing an  atmosphere  of  purity  and  serenity,"  in  spite 
of  the  poet's  own  assertions  that  he  loved  and  depicted 
impurity  as  much  as  he  loved  and  depicted  purity. 
John  Burroughs  said  that  "  Americans  may  now  come 
home:  unto  us  a  man  is  born."  He  credited  Whit- 
man with  "  the  primal  spirit  of  poesy  itself,"  "  the 
most  buoyant  and  pervasive  spirituality,"  "  the  most 
uncompromising  religious  purpose,"  though  he  saw  in 
him  grave  defects.  Alcott,  Conway,  Bryant,  Beecher, 
came  to  see  Whitman ;  and  in  England,  Lord  Hough- 
ton,  Myers,  and  Swinburne  praised  him,  though  Swin- 
burne came  at  last  to  break  away  from  his  spell. 
Women  have  been  found  to  justify  his  erotic  verse, 
and  to  see  in  it  only  the  frank  avowal  of  innocent  natu- 
ral instincts.  I  am'  content  to  place  my  reader  in  the 
seat  of  judgment.  Since  he  "  knows  the  ordinance 
of  God,  that  they  who  practise  such  things  are  worthy 


WHITMAN    CHANGED    BY    THE    CIVIL    WAR        445 

of  death,"  let  him  judge  whether  those  are  guiltless 
who,  though  they  do  not  the  same,  yet  "  consent  with 
those  who  practise  them." 

There  came  a  day  when  Whitman's  glorification  of 
sexual  relations  became  a  glorification  of  comradeship. 
The  passion  of  man  for  woman  gave  place  to  the 
passion  of  man  for  man,  and  this  passion  merged  into 
something  democratic  and  universal.  Our  Civil  War 
stirred  him.  I  do  not  find  that  he  had  interest  in  the 
slave,  or  that  he  rejoiced  in  his  emancipation.  He  was 
no  abolitionist,  at  least  in  his  later  years.  But  he  was 
concerned  for  the  Union  of  the  States,  and  for  the 
men  who  were  defending  it.  His  own  brother  was 
wounded  in  one  of  the  first  battles  of  the  war,  and 
Whitman  started  for  Washington  to  care  for  him. 
When  the  brother  recovered  from  what  proved  to  be 
a  slight  wound,  Whitman  began  a  visitation  and  help 
to  others  who  were  sick  and  wounded,  until  he  had 
ministered  in  this  way  to  nearly  a  hundred  thousand 
men.  We  must  not  withhold  from  this  service  our 
grateful  acknowledgments.  It  was  a  service  entirely 
voluntary  and  without  pay.  It  was  not  the  ordinary 
service  of  a  nurse,  but  that  of  a.  companion  and  friend. 
He  brought  paper  and  envelopes,  with  postage-stamps, 
and  wrote  letters  dictated  by  the  boys  to  their  parents 
or  friends  at  home.  He  carried  to  thousands  of  bed- 
sides little  packets  of  sweetmeats  or  tobacco.  He  even 
read  the  Bible  to  those  who  requested  it,  though  he 
ordinarily  trusted  more  to  his  own  kindly  and  sym- 
pathetic talk,  to  cheer  his  patient.  All  this  was  done 
in  hours  of  leisure  from  the  work  of  the  government 
office  in  which  he  had  found  employment,  and  its  value 


44^  THE   NEW    RESOLVE   OF   WHITMAN 

largely  consisted  in  the  unconventional  and  hearty 
method  of  his  address.  This  practical  work  for  others 
seems  to  be  the  result  of  a  vow  registered  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  war,  on  April  16,  1861,  and  suggested 
by  the  patriotic  rush  to  arms  by  so  many  of  the  youth 
of  the  land.  It  indicates  a  wider  outlook  and  an  im- 
pulse to  self-sacrifice,  which  before  this  time  we  see 
nothing  of.  The  record  of  this  new  resolve  was  found 
among  his  papers  after  his  death,  and  it  reads  as 
follows : 

I  have  this  day,  this  hour,  resolved  to  inaugurate  for  myself 
a  pure,  perfect,  sweet,  clean-blooded  robust  body,  by  ignor- 
ing all  drinks  but  water  and  pure  milk,  and  all  fat  meats, 
late  suppers — a  great  body,  a  purged,  cleansed,  spiritualized, 
invigorated  body. 

And  in  one  of  his  poems  he  writes : 

I  have  loved  the  earth,  sun,  animals — I  have  despised  riches, 
I  have  given  alms  to  every  one  that  ask'd,  stood  up  for  the 

stupid  and  crazy,  devoted  my  income  and  labor  to  others, 
I  have  hated  tyrants,  argued  not  concerning  God,  had 

patience  and  indulgence  toward  the  people,  taken  off  my 

hat  to  nothing  known  or  unknown, 


I  have  dismissed  whatever  insulted  my  own  Soul  or  defiled  my 
Body.  (303) 

Upon  this  breast  has  many  a  dying  soldier  lean'd,  to  breathe 

his  last; 
This  arm,  this  hand,  this  voice,  have  nourish'd,  rais'd, 

restored, 

To  life  recalling  many  a  prostrate  form: 
— I  am  willing  to  wait  to  be  understood  by  the  growth  of  the 

taste  of  myself, 
I  reject  none,  I  permit  all.  (304) 


"  A    BATTERED,    WRECKED    OLD    MAN  "  447 

There  is  no  need  of  censorship  of  his  writings  after 
1861.  His  literary  work  reflects  a  new  and  better  con- 
dition of  body.  It  was  well  that  he  then  pledged  him- 
self to  abstinence,  for  the  demands  upon  his  physical 
system  had  hitherto  been  great,  and  the  calls  for  sym- 
pathy in  his  new  work  of  relieving  suffering  were  still 
more  exhausting.  In  1873,  at  the  early  age  of  fifty- 
four,  he  broke  down.  A  stroke  of  paralysis  shattered 
his  seemingly  invulnerable  constitution,  and  from  the 
collapse  that  followed  he  never  fully  recovered.  After 
a  time  he  retired  to  Camden,  New  Jersey,  bought  him 
a  poor  little  house,  and,  with  the  aid  of  contributions 
from  friends  at  home  and  abroad,  spent  the  remainder 
of  his  life.  He  had  many  visitors.  On  his  seventieth 
birthday  he  was  given  a  public  reception  in  Camden, 
at  which  his  friends  gave  him  praise.  But  he  was,  to 
use  his  own  description  of  Columbus,  "  a  battered, 
wrecked  old  man."  And  in  1891,  when  seventy -two 
years  of  age,  he  breathed  his  last 

The  race  from  which  Walt  Whitman  sprang  has 
been  described  as  "  solid,  strong-framed,  long-lived, 
moderate  of  speech,  friendly,  fond  of  their  horses  and 
cattle,  sluggish  in  their  passions,  but  fearful  when  once 
started."  Our  poet  possessed  all  these  peculiarities  of 
both  body  and  mind.  As  a  boy,  he  was  healthy  and 
hearty.  As  teacher  of  a  country  school,  composed 
mostly  of  girls,  he  showed  little  sentiment  or  partiality 
toward  the  sex.  As  a  grown  man,  he  had  the  calm- 
ness and  benignity  of  good  nature.  These  were  natu- 
ral gifts.  But  behind  them  and  underlying  them  there 
was  a  passion  which,  when  roused,  knew  no  restraint. 
Robert  Louis  Stevenson's  description  of  the  Scot,  as 


448  THE    AFTERMATH    OF    WHITMAN 

"  an  iceberg  over  a  volcano,"  might  almost  apply  to 
Whitman.  On  occasion  he  could  let  himself  loose, 
and  he  did  this  in  his  tour  of  the  South.  The  echoes 
of  that  exuberant  life  were  always  sounding  within 
him.  But  the  woes  of  his  country  opened  to  him 
a  larger  vision.  A  sort  of  national,  yes,  even  of 
cosmic,  consciousness  was  developed.  His  chronic 
good  nature  poured  itself  forth  in  care  for  the  sick 
and  wounded.  He  gave  what  strength  he  had  to 
kindly  ministrations  at  their  bedsides,  until  paralysis 
seized  him  and  his  strength  was  gone.  His  after-life 
in  Camden  has  been  celebrated  as  the  monkish  retreat 
of  an  Oriental  guru,  lost  in  the  ecstasy  of  his  identi- 
fication with  the  All,  and  quietly  awaiting  the  trans- 
forming touch  of  death.  There  are  other  views,  how- 
ever, of  that  Camden  life,  and  I  am  permitted  to  quote 
the  following  passages  from  the  private  letter  of  a 
pastor  whose  work  in  that  city  filled  part  of  the  time 
of  Whitman's  residence  there : 

"  My  residence  in  Camden  came  in  the  period  of  what  might 
be  termed  the  aftermath  of  Whitman's  influence  in  the  city. 
As  there  was  not  much  of  the  earlier,  there  was  less  of  the 
later.  And  what  there  was,  was  wholly  inimical  to  righteous- 
ness. His  personal  laxity  of  belief,  if  not  of  act,  produced 
in  his  followers  a  license  for  physical  and  mental  indulgence. 
Last  winter  the  noblest  Christian  woman  it  was  my  privilege 
to  know  in  the  city  of  Camden  passed  away.  She  was  unj 
married  and  had  lived  to  her  eightieth  year.  She  possessed 
a  rare,  clear,  pure  mind,  and  had  a  remarkable  ability  to 
intuit  realities  back  of  appearances.  Often,  in  long  conver- 
sations with  her,  have  I  mentioned  the  person  of  Walt  Whit- 
man, whose  home  was  four  doors  removed  from  hers  during 
her  girlhood  and  young  womanhood.  She  told  me  that  hun- 
dreds of  times  she  had  passed  around  the  whole  block  to 
avoid  meeting  Walt  Whitman,  whose  very  eye  terrified  her 


"  THE    POETRY    OF    DEMOCRACY  "  449 

womanhood.  Last  fall  it  was  my  privilege  to  baptize  the 
last  member  of  the  '  Walt  Whitman  Club '  of  Camden.  The 
majority  had  died  drunkards,  and  only  the  grace  of  God  had 
saved  this  man  from  a  like  fate." 

The  result  of  my  inquiries  is  negative.  The  impres- 
sions of  the  aged  maiden  lady  thus  quoted  may  have 
been  derived  from  the  general  opinion  of  Christian 
circles,  which  in  its  turn  may  have  been  formed  by  the 
perusal  of  Whitman's  books,  and  not  from  personal 
acquaintance.  And  yet  I  cannot  ignore  the  testimony 
of  an  esteemed  pastor  to  the  effect  that  Walt  Whit- 
man's influence  was  antagonistic  to  Christianity  and 
to  morality. 

Walt  Whitman's  verse  was  called  by  Edward  Dow- 
den  "  the  poetry  of  Democracy."  John  Burroughs  too 
quotes  Whitman  as  saying  that  the  mother-idea  of 
his  poems  is  democracy,  and  democracy 

"  carried  far  beyond  politics  into  the  region  of  taste,  the  stand- 
ards of  manners  and  beauty,  and  even  into  philosophy  and 
theology." 

It  was  so,  only  because  the  poet  came  to  regard  him- 
self as  the  natural  representative  of  the  whole  race  of 
man.  He  was  an  Occidental  mystic,  who  identified 
himself  with  the  universe,  and  saw  in  his  own  body 
and  soul  the  very  flower  of  humanity.  "  He  uses  the 
communal  '  I,'  like  Krishna,"  said  Emerson.  Self- 
love  and  self-worship  expanded  into  a  kindly  sympathy 
with  all  forms  of  life.  A  universal  good  nature  was 
to  him  the  highest  form  of  virtue.  All  men  are  your 
brothers — in  their  failures  as  well  as  in  their  gifts,  in 
their  vices  as  well  as  in  their  virtues — therefore  be 


450  WHITMAN'S  DEMOCRACY  ANARCHY 

good  to  them!  Their  faults  are  part  of  them — smile, 
but  do  not  reprove!  "  Science  "  is  their  united  intel- 
lect; "the  States"  are  their  organized  force;  "De- 
mocracy "  is  their  collective  will.  Whitman  is  the 
apostle  of  this  democracy;  he  could  give  his  time  and 
labor  to  caring  for  the  suffering,  without  asking 
whether  they  were  Unionists  or  rebels;  so  he  could 
anticipate  a  day  when  there  would  be  "  one  heart  to 
the  globe."  As  against  the  exaggerated  nationalism 
of  our  day,  this  has  an  air  of  plausibility;  in  fact,  it 
is  but  the  elevation  of  the  actual  Walt  Whitman  into 
world-wide  validity,  the  declaration  of  independence 
on  the  part  of  every  individual,  the  transcending  of 
all  boundaries  of  law,  and  the  enthronement  of  arbi- 
trary impulse.  Democracy  of  this  sort  is  only  anarchy, 
with  a  better  name,  as  will  appear  by  mere  citation 
from  his  verses : 

I  swear  I  am  for  those  that  have  never  been  master'd! 

For  those  whom  laws,  theories,  conventions,  can  never 
master.  (306) 

Copious  as  you  are,  I  absorb  you  all  in  myself,  and  become 
the  master  myself.  (307) 

Race  of  veterans!     Race  of  victors! 

Race  of  the  soil,  ready  for  conflict!  race  of  the  conquering 

march! 

(No  more  credulity's  race,  abiding-temper'd  race;) 
Race  henceforth  owning  no  law  but  the  law  of  itself; 
Race  of  passion  and  the  storm.  (316) 

The  beauty  of  independence,  departure,  actions  that  rely  on 

themselves, 
The  American  contempt  for  statutes  and  ceremonies,  the 

boundless  impatience  of  restraint.  (158) 


WHITMAN'S  DEMOCRACY  ANARCHY  451 

I  have  lived  to  behold  man  burst  forth,  and  warlike  America 

rise; 
Hence  I  will  seek  no  more  the  food  of  the  northern  solitary 

wilds, 
No  more  on  the  mountains  roam,  or  sail  the  stormy  sea.  (247) 

0  such  for  me!    O  an  intense  life!    O  full  to  repletion,  and 

varied! 
The  life  of  the  theatre,  bar-room,  huge  hotel,  for  me!  (264) 

1  hear  the  jubilant  shouts  of  millions  of  men — I  hear 

LIBERTY!  (275) 

I  see  but  you,  O  warlike  pennant!     O  banner  so  broad,  with 

stripes,  I  sing  you  only, 
Flapping  up  there  in  the  wind.  (279) 

Once  fully  enslaved,  no  nation,  state,  city,  of  this  earth,  ever 

afterward  resumes  its  liberty.  (331) 
I  only  am  he  who  places  over  you  no  master,  owner,  better, 

God,  beyond  what  waits  intrinsically  in  yourself.  (333) 

Never  was  average  man,  his  soul,  more  energetic,  more  like  a 
God.  (335) 

Of  This  Union,  soak'd,  welded  in  blood — of  the  solemn  price 
paid — of  the  unnamed  lost,  ever  present  in  my  mind. 

Splendor  of  ended  day,  floating  and  filling  me! 
Hour  prophetic — hour  resuming  the  past!  (338) 

I  announce  a  race  of  splendid  and  savage  old  men.  (344) 

Lo,  Soul,  see'st  thou  not,  plain  as  the  sun, 
The  only  real  wealth  of  wealth  in  generosity, 
The  only  life  of  life  in  goodness?  (436) 

As  a  strong  bird  on  pinions  free, 
Joyous,  the  amplest  spaces  heavenward  cleaving, 
Such  be  the  thought  I'd  think  to-day  of  thee,  America, 
Such  be  the  recitative  I'd  bring  to-day  for  thee.  (451) 


452       INFLUENCE  OF  MUSIC  ON   WHITMAN  S  VERSE 

Some  of  these  verses  have  the  ring  of  true  poetry, 
for  they  are  both  rhythmical  and  musical.  It  is  in- 
teresting to  learn  that  Walt  Whitman  attributed  to 
music  much  of  his  inspiration : 

Ah,  from  a  little  child, 

Thou  knowest,  Soul,  how  to  me  all  sounds  became  music; 

My  mother's  voice,  in  lullaby  or  hymn; 


The  rain,  the  growing  corn,  the  breeze  among  the  long- 

leav'd  corn, 

The  measur'd  sea-surf,  beating  on  the  sand, 
The  twittering  bird,  the  hawk's  sharp  scream, 


The  lowing  cattle,  bleating  sheep — the  crowing  cock  at 
dawn.  (357,  358) 

He  was  a  great  lover  of  the  opera,  the  symphony,  and 
the  more  intricate  chamber-music  of  trained  perform- 
ers. This  is  all  the  more  remarkable  when  we  remem- 
ber that  he  disdained  the  full-orbed  music  of  verse,  and 
affected  a  recitative  that  was  well-nigh  destitute  of 
both  rhyme  and  rhythm.  In  his  longing  for  a  larger 
sort  of  harmony  he  threw  away  the  necessary  means 
for  its  attainment.  But  he  believed  that  humanity 
greatly  needed  "  strong,  melodious  songs,"  and  that 
the  great  West  of  America  would  yet  produce  them. 
This  reminds  us  once  more  of  Rousseau,  and  of  his 
dream  of  human  freedom  and  perfection.  The  free- 
dom, however,  is  freedom  from  restraint,  and  the  per- 
fection is  development  of  a  congenitally  pure  spirit. 
That  the  service  of  God  is  the  only  true  freedom,  and 
that  human  perfection  requires  submission  to  God's 
law,  seems  never  to  'have  dawned  upon  his  mind.  The 


WHITMAN'S  FANCY  TO  FOUND  A  RELIGION    453 

result  is  that,  like  Rousseau,  he  preaches  a  gospel  of 
license,  which  will  lead,  as  did  Rousseau's,  to  the 
disintegration  of  society  and  to  a  "  revolution  clad  in 
hell-fire."  He  banished  from  his  verse  the  rhyme  and 
rhythm  of  the  best  poetry,  although  the  harmonic 
chords  of  the  symphony  and  the  submission  of  the 
player  to  the  will  of  the  conductor  should  have  taught 
him  that  democracy  can  give  perfection  to  man  only 
as  each  individual  makes  his  freedom  the  voluntary 
executor  of  law  and  the  willing  instrument  of  the 
personal  God. 

•(All  this  bears  upon  the  final  question  of  Walt  Whit- 
man's religion.  For  he  fancied  himself  to  be  not 
only  the  preacher,  but  also  the  founder,  of  a  new 
religion.  It  was  a  religion  of  affectionate  comrade- 
ship, which  put,  in  place  of  the  God  of  love  and  law, 
the  misty  conception  of  a  materialistic  universe,  of  a 
democracy  free  to  do  evil  as  well  as  good,  and  of  an  in- 
dividualism in  which  the  body  is  supreme^.  A  frugal 
liver  after  1861,  he  passed  into  an  austerity  of  diet 
like  that  of  a  Roman  Catholic  ascetic.  Weighing  two 
hundred  pounds,  six  feet  in  height,  with  loosened  hair 
and  open  breast,  his  Jovian  countenance  and  master- 
ful composure  dominated  and  fascinated  his  visitors. 
Abraham  Lincoln  could  say,  "  Well,  he  looks  like  a 
man !  "  But  he  was  a  compound  of  the  mystic-  and 
the  hobo.  His  "  cosmic  consciousness "  was  never 
taught  to  recognize  Him  "  in  whom  all  things  consist," 
the  Creator  and  Redeemer  of  mankind.  He  had  no 
sense  of  sin,  and  he  felt  no  need  of  Christ.  Born  of 
the  people,  he  wished  to  express  their  life.  But  he 
had  no  proper  standard  by  which  to  judge.  He  did  not 


454     BURSTS    OF    LOFTY    THOUGHT    IN    WHITMAN 

see  that  there  is  much  in  life  which  is  not  worth  ex- 
pressing, much  evil  which  for  virtue's  sake  we  need 
to  cover  with  a  veil.  And  yet  there  are  occasional 
bursts  of  lofty  thought  and  emotion  that  make  us 
regret  that  his  wild  nature  was  not  tamed  and  made 
to  work  in  normal  traces.  "  It  pleased  God  to  reveal 
his  Son  in  me,"  said  Paul.  If  Walt  Whitman  could 
have  had  that  revelation  he  might  have  been  a  true 
poet  and  a  true  man.  That  knowledge  would  have 
organized  and  illuminated  his  verse;  would  have  led 
him  to  glorify  the  spirit  rather  than  the  body;  would 
have  shown  him  the  duty  of  confessing  sin  and  of 
accepting  Christ's  offer  of  salvation. 

And  yet  "  that  which  is  known  of  God  is  manifest," 
even  in  him.  In  a  temporary  retreat  which  he  found 
for  himself,  on  Timber  Creek  near  Camden,  he  com- 
muned with  nature : 

As  if  for  the  first  time,  indeed,  creation  for  the  first  time 
noiselessly  sank  into  and  through  me  its  placid  and  untellable 
lesson, — beyond — O,  so  infinitely  beyond! — anything  from  art. 
books,  sermons,  or  from  science,  old  or  new.  The  spirit's 
hour — religious  hour — the  visible  suggestion  of  God  in  space 
or  time — now  once  definitely  indicated,  if  never  again — the 
untold  pointed  at — the  heavens  all  paved  with  it.  The  Milky 
Way,  as  if  some  superhuman  symphony,  some  ode  of  univer- 
sal vagueness  disdaining  syllable  and  sound — a  flashing  glance 
of  Deity,  addressed  to  the  soul — all  silently — the  indescribable 
night  and  stars — far  off  and  silently.  .  . 
Proved  to  me  this  day,  beyond  cavil,  that  it  is  not  my  material 

eyes  which  finally  see, 
Nor  my  material  body  which  finally  loves,  walks,  laughs, 

shouts,  embraces,  procreates. 

Thought  of  the  Infinite,  the  All! 
Be  thou  my  God!  (382,  439) 


WHITMAN  S   AVERSION    TO    CHURCHES  455 

"  He  was  deeply  impressed,"  says  Mr.  Perry,  "by  the 
Sunday  services  for  the  insane,  in  Doctor  Bucke's 
Asylum,  rinding  beneath  these  crazed  faces,  strange 
as  it  may  seem,  the  peace  of  God  that  passeth  all  un- 
derstanding." 

These  were  only  transient  visitations  of  insight  and 
of  conscience.  In  his  early  notes  we  read  what  seems 
to  have  been  the  general  trend  of  his  thinking: 

Boldly  assume  that  all  the  usual  priests  .  .  .  are  infidels, 
and  the  .  .  .  are  Faithful  Believers  ...  I  am  as  much  Bud- 
dhist as  Christian,  .  .  as  much  nothing  as  something.  .  .  The 
churches  are  one  vast  lie.  The  people  do  not  believe  in 
them;  they  do  not  believe  in  themselves. 

I  do  not  despise  you,  priests; 

My  faith  is  the  greatest  of  faiths,  and  the  least  of  faiths, 
Enclosing  worship  ancient  and  modern,  and  all  between 
ancient  and  modern.  (82) 

I  have  the  idea  of  all,  and  am  all,  and  believe  in  all; 
I  believe  materialism  is  true,  and  spiritualism  is  true — I  reject 
no  part. 

I  adopt  each  theory,  myth,  god,  and  demi-god.  (189) 

In  1880  he  said  to  Doctor  Bucke : 

I  have  never  had  any  particular  religious  experiences — never 
felt  that  I  needed  to  be  saved — never  felt  .the  need  of  spirit- 
ual regeneration — never  had  any  fear  of  hell,  or  distrust  of 
the  scheme  of  the  universe.  I  always  felt  that  it  was  per- 
fectly right  and  for  the  best. 

"  In  his  youthful  note-book  he  remarks  that '  the  Bible 
is  now  exhausted,'  and  speaks  of  '  the  castrated  good- 
ness of  schools  and  churches.'  "  "  Irritated  by  '  par- 


456        WHITMAN'S  AVERSION  TO  CHURCHES 

sons  and  the  police,'  he  slammed  his  windows  tight  on 
Sunday,  to  keep  out  the  sound  of  the  bells  and  choir  of 
a  neighboring  church."  He  said : 

I  always  mistrust  a  deacon;  his  standard  is  low.  .  .  The 
whole  ideal  of  the  church  is  low,  loathsome,  horrible.  .  . 
"  Leaves  of  Grass  "  is  the  most  religious  book  among  books, 
crammed  full  of  faith.  .  .  Give  those  boys  a  chance — (some 
urchins  who  were  swimming  in  the  Schuylkill  River) — and 
they  would  develop  the  heroic  and  manly,  but  they  will  be 
spoiled  by  civilization,  religion  and  the  damnable  conventions. 
Their  parents  will  want  them  to  grow  up  genteel. 

I  have  said  that  the  soul  is  not  more  than  the  body, 
And  I  have  said  that  the  body  is  not  more  than  the  soul; 
And  nothing,  not  God,  is  greater  to  me  than  one's  self  is, 
And  whoever  walks  a  furlong  without  sympathy,  walks  to 
his  own  funeral  drest  in  his  shroud. 


And  I  say  to  mankind,  Be  not  curious  about  God. 


In  the  faces  of  men  and  women  I  see  God,  and  in  my  own 
face  in  the  glass.  (90) 

What  do  you  suppose  I  would  intimate  to  you  in  a  hundred 

ways,  but  that  man  or  woman  is  as  good  as  God? 
And  that  there  is  no  God  any  more  divine  than  Yourself?  (94) 

Underneath  Socrates  clearly  see — and  underneath  Christ  the 

divine  I  see, 
The  dear  love  of  man  for  his  comrade.  (125) 

Have  you  thought  there  could  be  but  a  single  Supreme? 

There  can  be  any  number  of  Supremes — One  does  not 

countervail  another,  any  more   than   one   eyesight  coun- 
tervails another,  or  one  life  countervails  another.  (291) 

It  is  I  who  am  great,  or  to  be  great — it  is  you  up  there,  or 
any  one.  (304) 


A    RELIGION    OF    UNMORAL   GOOD    NATURE        457 

Peter  Doyle  was  one  of  Whitman's  intimates,  and 
these  are  some  of  his  words  about  the  poet : 

"  He  had  pretty  vigorous  ideas  on  religion  ...  he  never 
went  to  church — didn't  like  form,  ceremonies — didn't  seem  to 
favor  preachers  at  all.  I  asked  him  about  the  hereafter,  '  There 
must  be  something,'  he  said.  '  There  can't  be  a  locomotive 
unless  there  is  somebody  to  run  it.'  I  have  heard  him  say 
that  if  a  person  was  the  right  sort  of  person — and  I  guess  he 
thought  all  persons  right  kind  of  persons, — he  couldn't  be 
destroyed  in  the  next  world  nor  in  this." 

Mr.  Perry  tells  us  that,  when  on  furlough  in  Brooklyn, 
Whitman  wrote  regularly  to  Peter  Doyle.  "  Some- 
times he  sent  Doyle  a  '  good  long '  kiss,  '  on  the  paper 
here/  like  an  affectionate  child.  Often  he  comforted 
him,  when  ill  or  out  of  work,  with  vigorous  admoni- 
tions "  like  the  following: 

As  long  as  the  Almighty  vouchsafes  you  health,  strength, 
and  a  clear  conscience,  let  other  things  do  their  worst, — and 
let  Riker  go  to  hell. 

Which  reminds  one  of  the  disciple  of  Nietzsche,  who 
condensed  his  precepts  for  conduct  into  the  words, 
"  So  live,  that  you  can  look  every  man  in  the  eye,  and 
tell  him  to — go  to  hell !  "  What  Walt  Whitman  meant 
by  "  religion  "  was  an  unmoral  good  nature  and  self- 
worship,  devoid  of  righteousness  or  law : 

Know  you!  solely  to  drop  in  the  earth  the  germs  of  a  greater 

Religion, 
The  following  chants,  each  for  its  kind,  I  sing.  (22) 

Omnes!     Omnes!  let  others  ignore  what  they  may; 

I  make  the  poem  of  evil  also — I  commemorate  that  part  also; 


45§  CHRIST,    BACCHUS,    AND    WHITMAN 

I  am  myself  just  as  much  evil  as  good,  and  my  nation  is — 

And  I  say  there  is  in  fact  no  evil; 
(Or  if  there  is,  I  say  it  is  just  as  important  to  you,  to  the  land, 

or  to  me,  as  anything  else.)  (20) 

I  too,  following  many,  and  follow'd  by  many,  inaugurate  a 

Religion — I  descend  into  the  arena; 
(It  may  be  I  am  destin'd  to  utter  the  loudest  cries  there,  the 

winner's  pealing  shouts; 
Who  knows?  they  may  rise  from  me  yet,  and  soar  above  every 

thing.) 

Each  is  not  for  its  own  sake; 

I  say  the  whole  earth,  and  all  the  stars  in  the  sky,  are  for 
Religion's  sake. 

I  say  no  man  has  ever  yet  been  half  devout  enough; 
None  has  ever  yet  adored  or  worship'd  half  enough; 
None  has  begun  to  think  how  divine  he  himself  is,  and  how 
certain  the  future  is. 

I  say  that  the  real  and  permanent  grandeur  of  These  States 

must  be  their  Religion; 

Otherwise  there  is  no  real  and  permanent  grandeur, 
(Nor  character,  nor  life  worthy  the  name,  without  Religion; 
Nor  land,  nor  man  or  woman,  without  Religion.)  (21) 

Swiftly  arose  and  spread  around  me  the  peace  and  knowledge 

that  pass  all  the  argument  of  the  earth; 

And  I  know  that  the  hand  of  God  is  the  promise  of  my  own, 
And  I  know  that  the  spirit  of  God  is  the  brother  of  my  own; 
And  that  all  the  men  ever  born  are  also  my  brothers,  and  the 

women  my  sisters  and  lovers; 
And  that  a  kelson  of  the  creation  is  love.  (35) 


The  poet  does  not  hesitate  to  compare  himself  with 
the  great  religious  leaders  of  the  past.  Christ  is  men- 
tioned casually,  in  company  with  the  mythical  Hercu- 
les, Hermes,  and  Bacchus.  Whitman  even  ventures  to 


"  DEMOCRATIC    VISTAS  "  459 

claim  affectionate  brotherhood  with  our  Lord,  in  his 
work  and  his  spirit : 

I  see  Christ  once  more  eating  the  bread  of  his  last  supper, 

in  the  midst  of  youths  and  old  persons; 
I  see  where  the  strong  divine  young  man,  the  Hercules,  toil'd 

faithfully  and  long,  and  then  died.  (144) 

TO  HIM  THAT  WAS  CRUCIFIED 

My  spirit  to  yours,  dear  brother; 

Do  not  mind  because  many,  sounding  your  name,  do  not 

understand  you; 
I  do  not  sound  your  name,  but  I  understand  you,  (there  are 

others  also;) 
I  specify  you  with  joy,  O  my  comrade,  to  salute  you,  and  to 

salute  those  who  are  with  you,  before  and  since — and 

those  to  come  also, 
That  we  all  labor  together,  transmitting  the  same  charge  and 

succession.  (116) 

In  "  Democratic  Vistas  "  the  poet  who  is  to  come 
follows  a  host  of  vanished  powers,  among  whom'  he 
sees  "  Christ,  with  bent  head,  brooding  love  and  peace, 
like  a  dove."  But  Whitman  himself  at  last  emerges 
as  the  true  Poet,  who  fills  all  things.  In  his  unbounded 
egotism  he  identifies  the  universe,  and  the  whole 
process  of  evolution,  with  himself,  and,  without  a 
thought  of  his  finiteness  and  sin,  aspires  to  take  the 
place  of  God  : 

With  laugh,  and  many  a  kiss, 

(Let  others  deprecate — let  others  weep  for  sin,  remorse, 

humiliation;) 
O  soul,  thou  pleasest  me — I  thee. 


O  Thou  transcendant! 

Nameless — the  fibre  and  the  breath!  (352) 


460  SELF-DEIFICATION    OF    WHITMAN 

How  should  I  think — how  breathe  a  single  breath — how 

speak — if,  out  of  myself, 
I  could  not  launch,  to  those,  superior  universes? 

Swiftly  I  shrivel  at  the  thought  of  God, 

At  Nature  and  its  wonders,  Time  and  Space  and  Death, 

But  that  I,  turning,  call  to  thee,  O  soul,  thou  actual  Me, 

And  lo!  thou  gently  masterest  the  orbs, 

Thou  matest  Time,  smilest  content  at  Death, 

And  fillest,  swellest  full,  the  vastnesses  of  Space.  (353) 

Finally  shall 'come  the  Poet,  worthy  that  name; 

The  true  Son  of  God  shall  come,  singing  his  songs.  (349) 

Nature  and  Man  shall  be  disjoin'd  and  diffused  no  more; 
The  true  Son  of  God  shall  absolutely  fuse  them.  (350) 


"  Chanting  the  Square  Deific  "  is  a  poem  after  the 
model  of  Emerson's  "  Brahma."  It  might  possibly 
be  interpreted  as  an  adoption  for  poetical  purposes  of 
an  Oriental  and  pantheistic  philosophy.  But  it  is  more 
than  this.  Whitman  made  this  philosophy  the  guide 
and  excuse  for  his  practical  life.  He  not  only  iden- 
tified himself  with  the  All,  but  he  regarded  the  All 
as  expressing  himself.  It  was  a  Brahminical  self- 
deification,  which  held  all  nature,  all  history,  all  re- 
ligions, as  the  outcome  of  the  one  life  that  throbbed 
in  his  veins  and  clamored  for  manifestation  in  himself. 
But  for  the  philosophic  garb  that  clothes  it,  and  for 
the  poetic  halo  that  surrounds  it,  we  might  call  it 
blasphemous.  We  must  not  determine  the  degree  to 
which  moral  perversity  may  unconsciously  reach.  Let 
me  only  quote  the  significant  lines  of  this  poem  which 
makes  Jehovah,  Christ,  Satan,  and  the  Holy  Spirit, 
equally  with  Brahma,  Saturn,  Hermes,  and  Hercules, 


"'  CHANTING    THE    SQUARE   DEIFIC  "  461 

to  be  mere  transient  effluences  from  the  poet's  change- 
less side: 

Chanting  the  square  deific,  out  of  the  One  advancing,  out  of 

the  sides; 

Out  of  the  old  and  new — out  of  the  square  entirely  divine, 
Solid,  four-sided,  (all  the  sides  needed)  .  .  .  from  this  side 

JEHOVAH  am  I, 
Old  Brahm  I,  and  I  Saturnius  am. 

Consolator  most  mild,  the  promis'd  one  advancing, 
With  gentle  hand  extended — the  mightier  God  am  I, 
Foretold  by  prophets  and  poets,  in  their  most  rapt  prophecies 

and  poems; 
From  this  side,  lo!  the  Lord  CHRIST  gazes— lo!    Hermes  I— 

lo!  mine  is  Hercules'  face.  (392,  393) 

For  I  am  affection — I  am  the  cheer-bringing  God,  with  hope, 
and  all-enclosing  Charity; 

But  my  Charity  has  no  death — my  Wisdom  dies  not,  neither 

early  nor  late, 
And  my  sweet  Love,  bequeath'd  here  and  elsewhere,  never 

dies. 


Defiant,  I,  SATAN,  still  live — still  utter  words — in  new  lands 

newly  appearing,  (and  old  ones  also;) 
Permanent  here,  from  my  side,  warlike,  equal  with  any,  real 

as  any, 
Nor  time,  nor  change,  shall  ever  change  me  or  my  words. 

Santa  SPIRITA,  breather,  life, 

Beyond  the  light,  lighter  than  light, 

Beyond  the  flames  of  hell — joyous,  leaping  easily  above  hell; 

Beyond  Paradise — perfumed  solely  with  mine  own  perfume; 

Including  all  life  upon  earth — touching,  including  God — 

including  Saviour  and  Satan; 
Ethereal,  pervading  all,  (for  without  me,  what  were  all?  what 

were  God?)    (393,  394) 


462          WHITMAN'S  VIEW  OF  IMMORTALITY 

It  is  difficult  to  determine,  and  still  more  difficult  to 
describe,  the  views  of  Whitman  with  regard  to  a  future 
life.  They  probably  varied  with  his  moods  of  feeling, 
and  became  more  definite  and  hopeful  toward  the 
close  of  his  career.  As  the  life  of  the  body  grew  feeble, 
the  desire  for  a  larger  and  freer  existence  grew 
stronger.  What  hope  he  had  seems  to  have  been 
derived  from  his  evolutionary  philosophy,  together 
with  an  unconscious  appropriation  of  the  Christian 
idea  of  progress  toward  the  good,  which  that  philos- 
ophy was  unable  to  supply: 

Now  that  he  has  gone  hence,  can  it  be  that  Thomas  Carlyle, 
soon  to  chemically  dissolve  in  ashes  and  by  winds,  remains 
an  identity  still?  .  .  Does  he  yet  exist,  a  definite,  vital  being, 
.  .  an  individual?  .  .  I  have  no  doubt  of  it.  .  .  When  depress'd 
by  some  specially  sad  event,  or  tearing  problem,  I  wait  till  I 
go  out  under  the  stars  for  the  last  voiceless  satisfaction. 

In  this  broad  Earth  of  ours, 
Amid  the  measureless  grossness  and  the  slag, 
Enclosed  and  safe  within  its  central  heart, 
Nestles  the  seed  Perfection.  (466) 

What  do  you  think  has  become  of  the  young  and  old  men? 
And  what  do  you  think  has  become  of  the  women  and 
children? 

They  are  alive  and  well  somewhere; 

The  smallest  sprout  shows  there  is  really  no  death; 

And  if  ever  there  was,  it  led  forward  life,  and  does  not  wait 

at  the  end  to  arrest  it, 
And  ceas'd  the  moment  life  appear'd.  (36) 

I  believe  of  all  those  billions  of  men  and  women  .  .  .  every 
one  exists  this  hour,  here  or  elsewhere,  invisible  to  us,  in 
exact  proportion  to  what  he  or  she  grew  from  in  life,  and 
out  of  what  he  or  she  did,  felt,  became,  loved,  sinn'd,  in 
Kfe.  (319) 


WHITMAN'S  VIEW  OF  IMMORTALITY          463 

For  what  is  the  present,  after  all,  but  a  growth  out  of  the 

past? 
(As  a  projectile,  form'd,  impell'd,  passing  a  certain  line, 

still  keeps  on, 
So  the  present,  utterly  form'd,  impell'd  by  the  past.)  (346) 

Are  Souls  drown'd  and  destroy'd  so? 
Is  only  matter  triumphant?  (355) 

The  dirge  and  desolation  of  mankind.  (356) 

I  hear  the  overweening,  mocking  voice, 
Matter  is  conqueror — matter,  triumphant  only, 
continues  onward. 


Tell  me  my  destination!  (397) 

I  understand  your  anguish,  but  I  cannot  help  you. 
Quicksand  years  that  whirl  me  I  know  not  whither.  (398) 

.  .  .  the  threat  of  what  is  call'd  hell  is  little  or  nothing  to  me; 
And  the  lure  of  what  is  called  heaven  is  little  or  nothing  to 

me; 
.  .  .  Dear  camerado!  I  confess  I  have  urged  you  onward  with 

me,  and  still  urge  you,  without  the  least  idea  what  is  our 

destination, 
Or  whether  we  shall  be  victorious,  or  utterly  quell'd  and 

defeated.  (181) 

Here  is  only  the  instinct  of  immortality,  vague  and 
dim,  without  the  certainty  afforded  by  a  positive  reve- 
lation. Evolution  has  its  unpromising  aspect  for  the 
soul  inclined  to  evil.  If  the  future  is  only  a  natural 
growth  out  of  the  past,  there  is  no  remedy  for  sin, 
and  no  prospect  other  than  a  reproduction  of  man's 
present  iniquity  and  misery.  For  this  reason  the 
poet's  verse  vibrates  between  a  dreadful  recognition 


464          WHITMAN'S  VIEW  OF  IMMORTALITY 

of  unchanging  abnormity,  and  an  irrational  ecstasy 
of  hope : 

I  say  distinctly  I  comprehend  no  better  sphere  than  this 

earth, 
I  comprehend  no  better  life  than  the  life  of  my  body.  (414) 

I  do  not  know  what  you  are  for,  .  . 
But  I  will  search  carefully  for  it.  (327) 

That  you  are  here — that  life  exists,  and  identity; 
That  the  powerful  play  goes  on,  and  you  will  contribute  a 
verse.  (324) 

With  that  sad,  incessant  refrain:  Wherefore,  unsatisfied  Soul? 
and  Whither,  O  mocking  Life?  (349) 

Behold  a  secret  silent  loathing  and  despair. 


Smartly  attired,  countenance  smiling,  form  upright,  death 
under  the  breast-bones,  hell  under  the  skull-bones.  (178) 

Not  one  word  or  deed — not  venereal  sore,  discoloration, 
privacy  of  the  onanist,  putridity  of  gluttons  or  rum- 
drinkers,  peculation,  cunning,  betrayal,  murder,  seduction, 
prostitution,  but  has  results  beyond  death,  as  really  as 
before  death.  (286) 


Yet  Whitman  cherishes  an  inextinguishable  hope. 
He  appropriates  the  results  of  Christianity,  without  ful- 
filling its  conditions: 

I  swear  I  think  there  is  nothing  but  immortality!  (392) 
My  rendezvous  is  appointed — it  is  certain; 
The  Lord  will  be  there,  and  wait  till  I  come,  on  perfect  terms; 
(The  great  Camerado,  the  lover  true  for  whom*  I  pine,  will  be 
there.)  (86) 


"  PASSAGE   TO    INDIA  "  465 

I  know  I  am  deathless; 

I  know  this  orbit  of  mine  cannot  be  swept  by  the  carpenter's 

compass; 
I  know  I  shall  not  pass  like  a  child's  carlacue  cut  with  a  burnt 

stick  at  night.  (50) 

Now  ending  well  in  death  the  splendid  fever  of  thy  deed, 


Thou  yieldest  up  thyself.  (488) 

O  my  brave  soul! 

O  farther,  farther  sail! 

O  daring  joy,  but  safe!    Are  they  not  all  the  seas  of  God! 

O  farther,  farther,  farther  sail!  (354) 


"  Passage  to  India  "  was  published  in  1870.  It  ex- 
presses Whitman's  later  longings  for  the  brotherhood 
of  man.  The  first  voyage  of  Columbus  is  made  the 
symbol  of  that  venture  of  the  spirit  which  heralds  and 
precedes  every  advance  into  the  future  of  the  individual 
and  of  the  race.  Of  this  collection  of  his  poems  he  said : 

There's  more  of  me,  the  essential,  ultimate  me,  in  that  than 
in  any  of  the  poems.  .  .  The  burden  of  it  is  evolution — the  one 
thing  escaping  the  other — the  unfolding  of  cosmic  purposes. 

Passage  to  India! 

Lo,  soul!  seest  thou  not  God's  purpose  from  the  first? 

The  earth  to  be  spann'd,  connected  by  net-work, 

The  people  to  become  brothers  and  sisters, 

The  races,  neighbors,  to  marry  and  be  given  in  marriage, 

The  oceans  to  be  cross'd,  the  distant  brought  near, 

The  lands  to  be  welded  together.  (347) 

O  glad,  exulting,  culminating  song! 
A  vigor  more  than  earth's  is  in  thy  riotes! 
Marches  of  victory^man  disenthrall'd — the  conqueror  at 
last!  (458) 


466  "  THE   SINGER   IN    THE    PRISON  " 

Roaming  in  thought  over  the  Universe,  I  saw  the  little  that  is 
Good  steadily  hastening  towards  immortality, 

And  the  vast  all  that  is  call'd  Evil  I  saw  hastening  to  merge 
itself  and  become  lost  and  dead.  (482) 

Ah  Genoese,  thy  dream!  thy  dream! 

Centuries  after  thou  art  laid  in  thy  grave, 

The  shore  thou  foundest  verifies  thy  dream.  (348) 

Have  we  not  grovell'd  here  long  enough,  eating  and  drinking 

like  mere  brutes? 
Have  we  not  darken'd  and  dazed  ourselves  with  books  long 

enough?  (354) 

For  presently,  O  soldiers,  we  too  camp  in  our  place  in  the 

bivouac-camps  of  green; 
But  we  need  not  provide  for  outposts,  nor  word  for  the 

countersign, 
Nor  drummer  to  beat  the  morning  drum.  (365) 

This  is  thy  hour  O  Soul,  thy  free  flight  into  the  wordless, 
Away  from  books,  away  from  art,  the  day  erased,  the  lesson 

done, 
Thee  fully  forth  emerging,  silent,  gazing,  pondering  the 

themes  thou  lovest  best. 
Night,  sleep,  and  the  stars.  (489) 

I  find  in  all  Whitman's  verses  only  one  poem  which 
indicates  that  he  had  grasped  the  idea  of  a  righteous 
God  and  of  a  righteous  administration  of  the  universe. 
To  him  law  and  penalty  are  non-existent;  justice  and 
judgment  are  not  the  foundations  of  God's  throne. 
Only  one  poem  intimates  that  the  thought  of  con- 
demnation and  retribution  had  ever  impressed  him,  and 
even  this  poem  makes  death,  and  not  a  suffering  and 
redeeming  God,  to  be  the  source  of  pardon.  That 
poem  is  entitled  "  The  Singer  in  the  Prison."  It 
shows  that  the  poet  had  powers  of  versification  which 


"  THE    MYSTIC   TRUMPETER  "  467 

it  surely  would  have  profited  him  more  commonly  to 
use: 

O  sight  of  shame,  and  pain,  and  dole! 
O  fearful  thought — a  convict  Soul! 


A  soul,  confined  by  bars  and  bands, 
Cries,  Help!    O  help!  and  wrings  her  hands; 
Blinded  her  eyes — bleeding  her  breast, 
Nor  pardon  finds,  nor  -balm  of  rest. 


It  was  not  I  that  sinn'd  the  sin, 
The  ruthless  Body  dragg'd  me  in; 
Though  long  I  strove  courageously, 
The  Body  was  too  much  for  me. 


(Dear  prison'd  Soul,  bear  up  a  space, 
For  soon  or  late  the  certain  grace; 
To  set  thee  free,  and  'bear  thee  home, 
The  Heavenly  Pardoner,  Death,  shall  come. 

Convict  no  more — nor  shame,  nor  dole! 
Depart!  a  God-en franchis'd  Soul!)  (420-422) 


Walt  Whitman's  doctrine  of  the  future  is  summed 
up  in  his  own  words,  especially  in  the  poem  entitled 
"  The  Mystic  Trumpeter,"  and  in  his  "  Song  of  the 
Universal  " : 


I  do  not  think  Life  provides  for  all,  and  for  Time  and  Space — 
but  I  believe  Heavenly  Death  provides  for  all.  (397) 

0  I  see  now  that  life  cannot  exhibit  all  to  me — as  the  day 

cannot, 

1  see  that  I  am  to  wait  for  what  will  be  exhibited  by 

death.  (436) 


468  "  SONG    OF    THE    UNIVERSAL  " 

Nothing  ever  has  been,  or  ever  can  be,  charged  against  me, 

half  as  bad  as  the  evil  I  really  am. 

I  charge  that  there  be  no  theory  or  school  founded  out  of  me; 
I  charge  you-  to  leave  all  free,  as  I  have  left  all  free.  (427) 

I  absolve  you  from  all  except  yourself,  spiritual,  bodily — 

that  is  eternal — you  yourself  will  surely  escape; 
The  corpse  you  will  leave  will  be  but  excrementitious.  (440) 

Hymns  to  the  universal  God,  from  universal  Man — all  joy! 
A  reborn  race  appears — a  perfect  World,  all  joy! 
Women  and  Men,  in  wisdom,  innocence  and  health — all  joy! 
Riotous,  laughing  bacchanals,  fill'd  with  joy!  (458) 

For  it,  the  partial  to  the  permanent  flowing, 
For  it,  the  Real  to  the  Ideal  tends. 

For  it,  the  mystic  evolution; 

Not  the  right  only  justified — what  we  call  evil  also  justified. 

From  imperfection's  murkiest  cloud, 
Darts  always  forth  one  ray  of  perfect  light, 
One  flash  of  Heaven's  glory.  (466,  467) 

Give  me,  O  God,  to  sing  that  thought! 

Give  me — give  him  or  her  I  love,  that  quenchless  faith 

In  Thy  ensemble.    Whatever  else  withheld,  withhold  not  from 

us, 

Belief  in  plan  of  Thee  enclosed  in  Time  and  Space; 
Health,  peace,  salvation  universal. 

Is  it  a  dream? 

Nay,  but  the  lack^  of  it  the  dream, 

And,  failing  it,  love's  lore  and  wealth  a  dream, 

And  all  the  world  a  dream.  (468) 

Was  Walt  Whitman  a  poet?  Yes,  a  poet  in  the 
lower  realms  of  poetry.  He  had  poetry  in  solution, 
which  needed  the  touch  of  creative  imagination  to 
crystallize  into  pleasing  form;  he  had  the  golden  ore, 


WITHOUT    LAW    AND    WITHOUT    LIBERTY          469 

but  it  was  so  mixed  with  quartz  and  slag  as  to  seem 
rough  and  uncouth;  he  had  flashes  of  insight,  but  his 
sky  was  generally  cloudy  and  of  uncertain  promise. 
His  poetry  lacked  in  substance  as  well  as  in  form.  He 
had  no  hold  upon  the  truth  of  things  that  enabled  him 
to  organize  his  material.  Arbitrary  in  form  as  in  sub- 
stance, he  apotheosized  the  body,  and  every  impulse 
of  the  body  was  represented  in  the  irregularity  and 
lawlessness  of  his  verse.  Whitman  sought  liberty 
without  law;  but,  because  he  ignored  Christ,  he  lost 
both  law  and  liberty.  His  fundamental  error  was  his 
choice  of  an  impersonal  and  non-moral,  in  place  of  a 
personal  and  moral  God.  Self-willed  and  pleasure- 
loving,  he  "  refused  to  have  God  in  his  knowledge," 
and  "  God  gave  him  up  to  a  reprobate  mind."  He 
lost  all  sense  of  righteousness  in  God  or  man.  The 
love  which  he  celebrated  was  love  without  moral  dis- 
tinctions, love  for  what  is,  rather  than  for  what  ought 
to  be,  love  for  nastiness  as  well  as  for  purity,  for 
wickedness  as  well  as  for  goodness,  for  the  wrong  as 
well  as  for  the  right.  We  search  his  work  from  end 
to  end,  but  find  no  recognition  of  any  Being  who  cares 
for  the  right  or  who  will  vindicate  it.  The  universe 
has  no  heart  that  can  feel,  and  no  will  that  can  con- 
trol ;  all  things  are  equally  phases  of  its  manifestation ; 
there  is  no  security  for  progress;  the  only  power  is 
man  himself.  Man  is  a  creature  of  evil  impulses  as 
well  as  of  good,  and  the  evil  are  often  supreme.  But 
yielding  to  the  evil  is  not  sin,  for  the  yielding  is  only 
a  product  of  man's  nature,  and  that  nature  is  primarily 
physical,  and  so,  destitute  of  conscience  or  will.  Since 
there  is  no  guilt,  there  can  be  no  atonement  and  no 


47O  WITHOUT    GOD   AND    WITHOUT    HOPE 

redemption.  Christ  is  only  one  of  many  good  ex- 
amples of  heroic  suffering,  and  the  poet  can  com- 
placently put  himself  by  Christ's  side.  What  hope  has 
he  for  the  future?  Only  a  vague  instinct  that  yearns 
for  another  and  a  better  life,  side  by  side  with  a  con- 
science that  witnesses  against  him,  and  protests  that 
all  right  to  such  a  life  has  been  forfeited  by  his  sin. 
"  Without  God  and  without  hope  "  is  the  verdict  of 
reason.  It  is  the  natural  and  necessary  outcome  of  a 
godless  philosophy  and  a  godless  life,  the  demonstra- 
tion of  the  moral  depths  to  which  poetry  can  descend 
when  liberty  is  divorced  from  law. 


GENERAL  INDEX 


GENERAL  INDEX 


Abbey,  112. 

Abbott,  J.  S.  C.,  213. 

Abbott,  Lyman,  345. 

"  Acknowledgment,"  401. 

"  Adonais,"  418. 

JEneid,  328. 

"  African  Chief,  The,"  24. 

"  After  the  Burial,"  275. 

"  After  the  Curfew,"  327. 

Agassiz,  229,  359. 

"  Ages,  The,"  14,  23,  25. 

Agnostitism,  344. 

Akenside,  269. 

"Al  Aaraaf,"  173. 

Alcott,  280,  444. 

"  Algic  Researches,"  232. 

Allan,  John,  164-167,  169,  170,  187. 

"  Alphonso,"  88. 

"  American  Scholar,  The,"   52. 

"Among  the  Hills,"  134. 

"Annabel  Lee,"   178. 

"  Annals  of  America,"  323. 

'•  Answer,  The,"  147. 

Anti-slavery  Declaration,    121. 

Anti-slavery  poems,  120,  134,  243, 
280-288. 

Anti-slavery  Society,   120. 

Apocalypticism,  89. 

Appleton,  Miss  F.  E.,  226. 

Arianism,  344. 

Aristotle,  342. 

Arminianism,   57,   76. 

Arnold,  Matthew,  22,  30,  75. 

"  Arsenal  at  Springfield,  The,"  244. 

Art:  impossible  without  morality, 
423;  degraded  by  pantheistic  phi- 
losophy, 433. 

"  Astrsea  at  the  Capitol,"  135. 

"  At  Eventide,"  135. 

"  At  the  Summit,"  361. 


Atonement,  222,  246,  261,  297,  307, 
309,  3i7,  343,  346,  354,  409,  466. 

Augustine,  157,  223. 

Aurelius,   Marcus,  97,  408. 

"  Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table, 
The,"  334,  338. 

Bachiler,  Stephen,  in. 

"  Ballad  of  Trees  and  the  Master, 
A,"  386. 

Bancroft,  George,  153. 

"  Banished  from  Massachusetts,"  112. 

"  Barbara  Frietchie,"   152. 

Barclay,  108. 

"  Barclay  of  Ury,"  134. 

"  Barefoot  Boy,  The,"  116. 

"  Battle-field,  The,"    28. 

Bay  Song  Book,  4. 

Beattie,  269. 

Beecher,  444. 

"  Beleagured  City,  The,"     257. 

"  Belfry  of  Bruges,  The,"  230. 

"  Bells,  The,"   192,   193. 

Bergson,  342. 

"  Between  the  Gates,"  145. 

Beyer,  202. 

Bible,  the:  as  God's  revelation,  61"; 
no  substitute  for  communion  with 
Christ,  80;  and  Emerson's  teach- 
ing, too;  and  the  authority  of  the 
Spirit,  1 08,  109;  the  guide  of 
Whittier,  131;  in  the  view  of 
Whitman,  455. 

Bigelow,  G.  T.,  326. 

"  Biglow  Papers,  The,"  268,  274,  275, 
282-289. 

"  Bill  and  Joe,"  326. 

Bla'ine,  J.  G.,  153. 

Blair,  n. 

Blake,  William,  427. 


2G 


473 


474 


GENERAL   INDEX 


"  Blessed  are  they  that  mourn,"  30. 

"  Blind  Bartimeus,"   252. 

Boccaccio,  218. 

Boethius,  27. 

"  Bonnie  George  Campbell,  The," 
250. 

"  Book,  The,"   131. 

Boston  Common,  no. 

"  Boylston  Prize  Dissertations,"  333. 

Bradstreet,  Anne,  6. 

Brahe,  Tycho,  173. 

"  Brahma,"  86,  460. 

Brahminism,  60,  97. 

"  Brewing  of  Soma,  The,"  155. 

"  Broomstick  Train,  The,"  363. 

Brown,  John,  123. 

Brownell,  202. 

Browning,   13,  28,  294,  300,  421. 

Brownson,  280. 

Bryant,  William  Cullen:  poetry  and 
theology  of,  1-48;  ancestry  of,  5; 
birthplace  and  early  discipline  of, 
6;  educational  influences  surround- 
ing, 7;  lack  of  college  training  of, 
8,  44;  early  poems  of,  9;  Words- 
worth's influence  upon,  n,  13; 
perennial  genius  of,  12;  wide 
stretch  of  activity  of,  13;  the  cory- 
pheus  of  American  poets,  14;  ex- 
changes the  law  for  letters,  15; 
editor  of  "  The  Evening  Post,"  16; 
public  services  of,  17;  physical 
conditions  of  energy  of,  18;  re- 
ligious belief  and  habits  of,  19,  20; 
a  Christian  poet,  21,  22,  31-36;  hu- 
man sin  and  divine  justice  and 
love  in  poetry  of,  23-27;  humor  of, 
27,  28;  a  hymn-writer,  31-35,  252; 
most  significant  religious  poem  of, 
35 ;  the  Cross  rarely  in  verses  of, 
36;  love-songs  of,  36,  37;  view  of 
immortality  held  by,  37-43;  filial 
piety  of,  41;  limitations  of,  43, 
44;  somberness  of  verses  of,  44, 
45;  translator  of  Homer,  46,  47, 
261;  summary  of  character  of,  48; 
father  of  American  poetry,  210; 
first  poet  to  influence  Longfellow, 
212;  in  contrast  with  Lowell,  267; 
in  "  Fable  for  Critics,"  279;  visits 
Whitman,  444. 


Bucke,  455. 

Buckle,  Henry  Thomas,  3. 

Buddha,  407. 

Buddhists,  346. 

"  Building  of  the  Ship,  The,"  244. 

Bulwer,  204. 

Bunyan,  324. 

"  Burial-place,  The,"  4. 

Burns,  Robert,  107,  152,  157,  284. 

Burroughs,  John,  444,  449. 

Butler,  269. 

Byron,  45,  203,  231,  269,  279. 

Cabot,  55,  102. 

"  Calamus,"  440. 

Calvin,  340,  341,  349. 

Calvinism,  51,  57,  63,  79,  115,  US, 
221,  304,  321,  324,  339-343,  347, 
349,  351,  376,  385. 

"  Cantata  "  for  the  Centennial,  390- 
392. 

Carlisle,  Speaker,  153. 

Carlyle,  84,  87,  94,  95,  177,  280. 

Carpenter,  G.  R.,  425. 

"  Cathedral,  The,"  275,  294-300,  305. 

Catullus,  202. 

"  Caxtons,  The,"  204. 

"  Celestial  Love,  The,"  71,  92. 

"  Chambered  Nautilus,  The,"  337, 
346. 

Channing,  101,  243. 

"  Chanting  the  Square  Deific,"  460. 

Chaucer,  13,  263. 

Christ:  nativity  of,  32;  world-wide 
supremacy  of,  35;  as  an  atoning 
Saviour,  36,  59;  as  a  present  com- 
panion, 45,  48;  immanence  of,  65; 
final  test  of  a  poet's  worth,  81;  in 
the  thought  of  Emerson,  82;  ab- 
sorbs and  transforms,  83;  has  glo- 
rified nature  and  man,  89;  and 
immortality,  96,  187;  within,  109; 
within,  one  with  the  historic,  no; 
in  the  thought  of  Whittier,  139- 
145;  absent  from  the  vision  of  Poe, 
193,  198;  the  final  Judge,  202;  in 
the  view  of  Longfellow,  223,  235- 
239,  241,  242,  246,  261;  in  the 
view  of  Lowell,  297-301,  304,  309, 
312,  317;  in  the  view  of  Holmes, 
343-347;  in  the  view  of  Lyman 


GENERAL   INDEX 


475 


Abbott,  345;  in  the  view  of 
Lanier,  386,  399,  400,  407-410, 
412,  418;  Elias  Hicks  denies  di- 
vinity of,  428;  in  the  view  of 
Whitman,  453,  454,  456,  458-461, 
470. 

Christianity,  in  the  thought  of 
Emerson,  94. 

"  Christus,"  224,  231,  234-236,  253, 
254- 

Cicero,  89,  97. 

Clarke,  J.  F.,  326. 

Cleaveland,  Parker,  256. 

"  Clover,"  402. 

Coleridge,  Hartley,  30. 

Coleridge,  S.  T.,  269. 

Collins,  William,   162. 

Colman,  George,  250. 

"  Commemoration  Ode,"  275,  290. 

Confucius,   142. 

Congregationalism,   345,  346. 

"  Conqueror  Worm,  The,"   189,  190. 

Conway,  444. 

Cooke,  95. 

Cooper,  232,  280. 

"  Coplas  de  Manrique,"  259. 

"  Corn,"  387,  388. 

"  Cotter's  Saturday  Night,"    157. 

"  Courtin',  The,"  289. 

"  Courtship  of  Miles  Standish,"  231, 
234- 

Cowley,  263,  269,  392. 

Cowper,  1 1 6. 

"  Creative  Evolution,"  342. 

"  Crooked  Footpath,  The,"  349. 

"  Cross  of  Snow,  The,"  229. 

Crowninshield,  F.  B.,  326. 

"  Crucifixion,  The,"  142. 

"  Cry  of  a  Lost  Soul,  The,"  148. 

"  Crystal,  The,"  407. 

Cummington,  5. 

"  Cupido,"  84-86. 

Curtis,  B.  R.,  326. 

Curtis,  G.  W.,  n,  20,  228,  302. 

Cushing,  Caleb,  125. 

Cushman,  Charlotte,  410. 

Dana,  280. 

Dante,  67,    187,   212,   224,  228,   262, 

405,  408,  421,  436. 
Darwin,  Francis,  342, 


Davis,  G.  F.,  326. 

"  Day  is  Done,  The,"  225. 

Day,  Miss  Mary,  379. 

"  Deacon's  Masterpiece,  The,"  336. 

"  Death  of  the  Flowers,  The,"  39. 

Deism,  57. 

"  Democratic  Vistas,"  459. 

"  Deserted  Village,"  157. 

"  Destiny,"  70. 

Dickens,  321. 

"  Divine    Comedy,"    187,    224,    262, 

311. 

"  Divine  Right  of  Kings,  The,"  167. 
"  Divine  Tragedy,  The,"  235. 
Doctor  Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde,  180. 
"  Doll's  House,  The,"    88. 
"  Domain  of  Arnheim,  The,"  188. 
Donne,   392. 
"  Dorothy  Q.,"  322. 
Douglass,  Frederick,  153. 
Dowden,  Edward,  436,  449. 
Doyle,  Peter,  457. 
"  Dream  of  Summer,  A,"  133. 
Dryden,  263. 
Dualism,  101. 
Dyer,  Mary,  no. 

"  Earth,"  23. 

Edwards,  Jonathan,  65,  84,  236,  351. 

"Bin  Feste  Burg  1st  Unser  Gott," 
134- 

"  Elegy,"  Gray's,  n6. 

"  Eleonora,"   177. 

Eliot,  President,  344. 

Ellis,  no. 

"  Elsie  Venner,"  338,  339. 

Emerson,  Ralph  Waldo:  poetry  and 
theology  of,  49-103;  Puritan  an- 
cestry of,  51;  education  of,  52; 
compared  with  Bryant,  53;  a  poet- 
ical philosopher,  54;  explained 
man  by  nature,  55;  defect  in 
thinking  of,  56;  factors  in  tran- 
scendentalism of,  56-62;  rejected 
external  authority,  59;  sources  of 
doctrine  of,  62;  eclecticism  of,  63; 
denies  personality  to  God,  63;  had 
no  sense  of  sin,  66;  taught  the 
"  green-apple  theory  "  of  evil,  67, 
and  salvation  by  character,  72; 
conception  of  poetry  held  by,  73, 


476 


GENERAL   INDEX 


74;  had  poetical  substance  without 
form,  75;  theological  ideas  of,  76; 
gave  up  prayer  and  the  Lord's 
Supper,  77,  83;  scoffed  at  Provi- 
dence, 78;  value  of  positive  doc- 
trine of,  80;  slightingly  alludes  to 
Christ,  81;  worshiper  of  successful 
force,  84;  confounds  moral  dis- 
tinctions, 86,  307;  had  no  personal 
intimacies,  87;  questioned  ethics 
of  Jesus,  88;  owed  much  to  Christ, 
89;  music  of  verses  of,  90;  scorned 
the  individual,  91;  no  controver- 
sialist, 93;  doubtful  of  personal 
immortality,  95;  personal  pecu- 
liarities and  habits  of,  97;  afflicted 
with  loss  of  memory,  98;  a  non- 
ethical  monist,  100;  drift  of  influ- 
ence of,  102;  death  of,  102;  quoted 
by  Whittier,  149;  preceded  by 
Whittier  in  anti-slavery  movement, 
152;  called  Foe  "the  jingleman," 
202;  contrasted  with  Longfellow, 
210,  250;  in  estimate  of  Lowell, 
269;  in  "  Fable  for  Critics,"  280; 
New  England  spirit  in,  334;  a  full- 
fledged  pantheist,  344;  influenced 
Longfellow  and  Lowell  theologic- 
ally, 345;  "Life  of,"  357;  con- 
trasted with  Holmes,  357;  char- 
acterized by  Lanier,  408;  influ- 
enced Whitman,  428-432;  letter  of 
Whitman  to,  441;  comments  on 
Whitman,  449. 

"  Enchanter,  The,"  73. 

Epicureanism,   142,  254. 

"  Epistle  to  George  William  Curtis," 
302. 

"  Essay  on  History,"  motto  to  the, 
87. 

"  Eternal  Goodness,  The,"  154. 

"  Eureka,"  184-187,  191. 

"  Eurydice,  "  274. 

"  Evangeline,"  231,  232. 

"  Evening  Song,"  405. 

Everett,  359. 

"  Excelsior,"  230. 

"Exile's  Departure,  The,"  117. 

"Expostulation,"  121. 

Ezekiel,  341. 

"  Ezekiel,"  122, 


"  Fable    for    Critics,    A,"    274,    279, 

317- 
"  Fall  of  the  House  of  Usher,  The," 

204. 

"  Farewell  to  Agassiz,  A,"  360. 
"  Fate,"  91. 
"  Faust,"  235. 
Federal  theology,  221,  341. 
Felton,  229. 

"  Flood  of  Years,  The,"  43. 
"  Florida  Sunday,  A,"  400. 
"  Flowers,"  259. 

"  Footsteps  of  Angels,  The,"  219. 
"  For  Annie,"  191. 
"  Forest  Hymn,  A,"  22. 
"  Fountain,  The,"  25. 
Fox,  George,  63,  66,  108,  in,  428. 
Franco,  280. 
Franklin,  142. 
"  Freedom,"  72. 
Free-verse,  423,  424,  435. 
"  Fringed  Gentian,  The,"  42. 
Fugitive  Slave  Law,   125. 
Fuller,  Miss,  177,  280. 
"  Future  Life,  The,"  24,  39. 

Galton,  342. 

Gannett,  W.  C.,  44. 

Garfield,  359. 

Garrison,  William  Lloyd,  117,  119, 
120,  122,  124,  125,  314. 

"  Genevieve,"  37. 

"  Give  All  to  Love,"  69. 

God:  in  English  deism,  57;  in  the 
thought  of  Emerson,  62-66,  76,  89, 
95,  100-102;  transcendence  and 
personality  of,  100;  in  the  thought 
of  Whittier,  134-140,  145-148;  in 
the  thought  of  Poe,  181-191;  in 
the  view  of  Longfellow,  223,  246, 
261;  in  the  view  of  Lowell,  295- 
300,  302-304,  306,  309,  312,  317; 
in  the  view  of  Holmes,  341-352, 
355.  356;  in  the  view  of  Lanier, 
376,  382,  385,  393-396,  400-404, 
406,  409,  410,  414;  in  the  view 
of  Whitman,  432,  436,  437,  439, 
442,  443,  452-461,  466,  469. 

Goethe,  75,  91,  97,  231,  232,  235, 
240,  421. 

"  Gold  Bug,  The,"  175. 


GENERAL  INDEX 


477 


"  Golden  Legend,  The,"  235,  236. 

Goldsmith,  Oliver,   157. 

"  Good-bye,"  77,  99. 

Gosse,  202. 

"  Grace,"  71. 

"  Grandmother's     Story    of    Bunker 

Hill  Battle,"  364. 
"  Grave  by  the  Lake,  The,"  139. 
Gray,  116. 
"  Great    Poets    and   Their   Theology, 

The,"  v,  421. 
"  Green   River,"   15. 
Greene,  G.  W.,  216. 
Griswold,  R.  W.,  163,  177,  203  205. 
"  Guardian  Angel,  The,"  338,  339. 

Hague,  Dr.  W.,  66,  102. 

Halleck,  280. 

Hamilton,  Gail,  122. 

Harrison,  62. 

"  Haunted  Palace,  The,"   200,   201. 

Hawthorne,  103,  213,  229,  232,  280. 

Hayne,  P.  H.,  416. 

"Healer,  The,"  144. 

Heckewelder,  214. 

"  He  hath  put  all  things  under  His 
feet,"  35- 

Heine,  202. 

"  Hermann  and  Dorothea,"  232. 

"Hermes  Trismegistus,"  241,  242. 

"  Heroism,"  92. 

"Hiawatha,"  214,  231-233,  250. 

Hicksite  party,  109,  143,  428. 

Hillard,  229. 

"  History   of   Redemption,"   236. 

Holmes,  Oliver  Wendell:  and  Emer- 
son, 97;  author  of  tribute  to  Whit- 
tier,  158;  in  "Fable  for  Critics," 
280;  poetry  and  theology  of,  319- 
367;  our  poetical  humorist,  321, 
329;  parents  of,  322;  conceived 
boyhood  dislike  for  Calvinism, 
324;  school  days  of,  325;  college 
classmates  of,  326;  writer  of  class- 
poems,  326-328;  early  verses  of, 
328;  a  medical  student  abroad, 
331;  a  medical  practitioner,  332; 
lecturer,  essayist,  and  poet,  333; 
gains  attention  by  his  prose,  333; 
greatest  in  his  conversation,  334; 
New  England  spirit  in,  334;  made 


himself  and  "  The  Atlantic "  by 
"  The  Autocrat,"  335 ;  best  poetical 
work  of,  337;  ventures  into  fiction, 
338;  most  consciously  and  inten- 
tionally theological  of  our  poets, 
339;  inveterate  hater  of  Calvinism, 
339;  misunderstood  Calvinism,  340, 
349;  opposed  by  Scripture  and 

.  philosophy,  341,  342;  has  practic- 
ally the  theology  of  Herbert  Spen- 
cer, 345;  wrote  hymns  to  the  God 
of  nature,  346;  perhaps  uncon- 
sciously regenerate,  348;  bitter 
prejudice  of,  350;  excused  by  ex- 
travagances of  hyper-Calvinists, 
351;  ethical  fruits  of  doctrine  of, 
352;  no  reformer,  353;  touched 
the  surface  of  life,  353;  felicitous 
in  patriotic  hymns,  355;  contrasted 
with  Emerson,  357;  a  correspond- 
ent of  Motley  and  Lowell,  358; 
paid  worthy  tribute  to  his  friends, 
359;  the  poet  of  this  life,  362;  with 
humor  fresh  in  his  age,  363. 

Homer,  4,  47,  261,  410,  421,  436. 

"  Homoeopathy,"  351. 

Hopkins,  Mark,  n. 

Horace,  269. 

"  How  Love  Looked  for  Hell," 
403. 

"  How  the  Old  Horse  Won  the  Bet," 
365- 

Howe,  359. 

Howe,  John,  201. 

Howells,  William  Dean,  444. 

"  Hudibras,"  269. 

"Humble-Bee,  The,"  251. 

"  Hundred  Days  in  Europe,"  363. 

Hutton,  22. 

"  Hymn  for  my  Brother's  Ordina- 
tion," 237,  238. 

"  Hymn  of  the  Sea,  A,"  23. 

"  Hymn  of  Trust,"  348. 

"  Hymn  to  Death,"  8,  26,  41. 

"  Hyperion,"  220,  221,  224. 

Ibsen,  88. 

"  I  Cannot  Forget,"  9. 
"  Ichabod,"  125. 
Idealism,  English,  56. 
Immanence,  Oriental,  62. 


GENERAL   INDEX 


Immortality,  37-43,  95,   148-150,   186, 

187,    256-261,    301,    302,    405-407, 

462,  467. 

"  Imp  of  the  Perverse,  The,"  176. 
"  In  Memoriam,"  238. 
"  In  Memory,"  135. 
Incarnation,  344. 

"  Indian  Girl's  Lament,  The,"  41. 
"  Individuality,"   395. 
"  Inferno,"  262. 
Inner  light,  66,  109,  114,  428. 
"'inscription  for  a  Well  in  Memory 

of  the  Martyrs  of  the  War,"  93. 
"  Inscription  for  the  Entrance  to  a 

Wood,"  23,  26. 

Inspiration,   222,   305-307,   428. 
Intemperate,  Bryant's  prayer  for  the, 

34- 

"  International  Copyright,"  288. 
Intuitionalism,  German,  56,  57. 
"  Irene,"  166. 
"  Irene,"  272. 
"  Iron  Gate,  The,"  366. 
Irving,  Washington,  212,  216. 
"  Italy,"   123. 

"Jacquerie,  The,"  384,  389. 

James,  Henry,  66,  94,  202. 

"  Journey  of  Life,  The,"  43. 

Judaism,  344. 

"  June,"  41. 

"  Justice  and  Expediency,"  121. 

"  Kalevala,"  232. 

Kant,  57,  342. 

"  Kavanagh,"  224,  245. 

"  Keramos,"  245. 

Kingsley,  Charles,  262. 

"  Knight  and  Friar,"  250. 

"  Lakeside,  The,"  133. 

Lamb,  Charles,   149. 

"  Lament  for  the  Royal  George," 
116. 

Lang,  Andrew,  203. 

Lanier,  Sidney:  and  the  mechan- 
ism of  verse,  127;  improved  on 
Poe's  theory  of  poetry,  192; 
poetry  and  theology  of,  369-418; 
our  chief  poetical  musician,  371; 
contrasted  with  Poe,  372,  415, 


418;  parents  of,  373;  had  a  pas- 
sion for  music,  374;  educational 
beginnings  of,  375 ;  struggles  to 
learn  his  duty,  376;  influenced  by 
teacher  of  science,  377;  a  South- 
ern volunteer,  378;  broken  in 
health  by  army  life,  379;  desper- 
ate illness  of,  380;  dawn  of  poet- 
ical ambition  of,  381;  somberness, 
yet  sweetness  and  maturity,  in  ear- 
liest poetry  of,  382,  383;  a  lec- 
tprer  on  literature,  387;  gains 
public  notice  by  "Corn,"  387; 


Centennial,  390;  defects  in  style 
of,  392;  physical  handicap  of,  393; 
interpreted  poetry  in  terms  of 
music,  397-399;  music  too  much 
dominated  poetry  of,  399;  religion 
ground  of  sense  of  duty  of,  399; 
believed  love  rules  the  universe, 
401-403;  believed  in  immortality, 
405-407;  last  poem  of,  406;  great- 
est poem  of,  407;  sums  up  his  es- 
timate of  Christ,  409;  affection  and 
optimism  of,  410;  nature  interpre- 
ted by,  412,  413;  science  of  ver- 
sification overrated  by,  414;  in- 
domitable spirit  of,  415;  last  days 
of,  416;  a  great  poet  in  the  ma- 
king, 416;  in  relation  to  immor- 
tality, 417. 

Laplace,  187. 

"  Last  Judgment,"  187. 

"  Last  Leaf,  The,"  329,  337. 

"  Laus   Veneris,"    136. 

Lauvriere,  203. 

"  Leaves  of  Grass,"  428,  429,  441- 
444,  456. 

"  Leaves-Droppings,"  441. 

"  Lenore,"  166. 

"  Liberator,  The,"  120. 

"  Library  of  Poetry  and  Song,"  46. 

"  Life,"  78,  79. 

"  Life  of  General  Greene,"  216. 

"  Life  That  Is,  The,"  37. 

"  Lifetime,  A,"  38. 

"  Light  of  Stars,  The,"  258. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  153,  291,  430, 
434,  453- 

"  Living  Temple,  The,"  201. 


GENERAL    INDEX 


479 


Longfellow,  Henry  Wadsworth: 
Emerson  at  the  funeral  of,  98; 
tribute  of  Whittier  to,  149;  pre- 
ceded by  Whittier  in  anti-slavery 
movement,  152;  abusively  criticized 
by  Poe,  176,  177;  poetry  and  the- 
ology of,  207-263;  the  last  genera- 
tion influenced  by,  209;  most  be- 
loved of  American  poets,  210; 
parents  of,  210;  early  environment 
of,  211,  212;  college  training  and 
classmates  of,  213;  interested  in 
Indian  life  by  surroundings  in 
Maine,  213;  early  verses  and  liter- 
ary ambition  of,  214,  215;  pro- 
fessor at  Bowdoin,  215;  goes 
abroad  for  three  years,  215,  216; 
as  a  teacher,  217;  marriage  of, 
219;  turning-point  in  career  of, 
220;  unevangelical,  222;  a  Pela- 
gian, but  a  Christian  poet,  223; 
translated  Dante,  224,  228,  262 ; 
discovers  his  vocation,  225;  pros- 
perity and  growing  fame  of,  226; 
truly  national  poet,  227;  loses  his 
second  wife,  228;  friends  of,  229; 
most  productive  period  of,  230; 
most  successful  in  shorter  poems, 
231;  appreciated  good  in  heathen 
peoples,  233;  faults  in  longer 
poems,  234;  insufficiently  estimates 
Christ,  235-239,  241,  242,  261; 
ein  in  the  view  of,  236;  neither 
skeptic  nor  mystic,  238;  tends  to 
pagan  views,  239;  had  faith  in 
Christ's  human  example,  242;  poet 
of  Union,  244,  and  of  peace,  244; 
fundamental  theological  defect  of, 
246;  most  mature  work  of,  249; 
kindly  spirit  of,  250;  in  relation  to 
Emerson,  250;  affectionate  and 
gentle,  251;  no  dogmatist,  252, 
*53;  Christian  spirit  in  poetry  of, 
253;  believed  in  immortality,  256- 
?6i;  found  congenial  field  in  trans- 
lating "  Purgatorio  "  and  "  Para- 
diso,"  262 ;  sunny  and  genial  to 
the  last,  262;  honored  in  Poets' 
Corner,  263;  in  contrast  with 
Lowell,  267;  succeeded  in  Har- 
vard by  Lowell,  290;  New  En- 


gland  spirit  in,  334;  under  influ- 
ence of  Emerson,  344;  memorial 
of  Holmes  to,  359. 

Longfellow,    Samuel,   209. 

Lord's  Supper,  The,  20,  77,  83. 

"  Lost  in  Him,"  92. 

"  Lost  Occasion,  The,"  126. 

Lowell,  James  Russell:  compared 
with  Bryant,  28;  preceded  by 
Whittier  in  anti-slavery  move- 
ment, 152;  criticized  by  Poe,  177; 
wrote  tribute  to  Longfellow,  263; 
poetry  and  theology  of,  265-317; 
our  chief  poetical  moralist,  267; 
in  contrast  with  other  poets,  267; 
typical  man  of  letters,  267;  par- 
entage and  boyhood  of,  268; 
knew  the  Yankee  dialect,  268,  285- 
289;  at  college,  269;  literary  and 
ethical  bent  of,  270;  marriage  di- 
rects the  genius  of,  271;  early 
poems  of,  272;  early  straits  and 
bereavements  of,  273;  ethical  and 
patriotic  genius  of,  275;  in  the 
realm  of  pure  poetry,  275;  growth 
of  ethical  principle  of,  277;  most 
perfect  work  of,  278;  first  gush  of 
wit  of,  279;  turns  from  literature 
to  politics,  280;  greatest  achieve- 
ment of,  282;  professor  in  Har- 
vard, 289;  prose  work  of,  290; 
loses  youthful  spontaneity,  290; 
most  productive  years  of,  292;  as 
editor,  diplomat,  and  wit,  293; 
last  notable  poetic  work  of,  294; 
confesses  his  faith  in  "  The  Cathe- 
dral," 295;  theology  of,  295-313; 
without  definite  belief  in  immor- 
tality, 301 ;  a  theist,  not  a  Chris- 
tian, 302 ;  missed  the  true  theory 
of  morals,  303;  had  a  Calvinistic 
inheritance  of  virtues,  304;  denied 
special  inspiration,  305;  inferior  in 
moral  earnestness  to  Wordsworth, 
308;  misunderstands  and  derides 
the  atonement,  309,  310;  a  greater 
poet  if  a  greater  man,  312;  served 
democracy  by  inherited  theistic 
faith,  313;  greater  as  an  essayist 
than  as  a  poet,  314;  paid  high  trib- 
ute to  his  friends,  314;  made 


480 


GENERAL    INDEX 


modest  estimate  of  himself,  316; 
shortcomings  of,  317;  indebted  to 
wit  as  instrument  in  poetry,  321; 
made  Holmes  a  contributor  to 
"The  Atlantic,"  334;  New  En- 
gland spirit  in,  334;  under  influ- 
ence of  Emerson,  344;  objects  to 
allusion  of  Holmes,  353;  a  cor- 
respondent of  Holmes,  358;  me- 
morial of  Holmes  to,  359;  greet- 
ing "  To  Holmes  "  by,  367. 
Luther,  120. 

Macaulay,  290. 

"  Manuscript  Found  in  a  Bottle,  A," 
171. 

"  Marshes  of  Glynn,  The,"  393,  396. 

"  Martin  Franc,  or  the  Monk  of 
Saint  Anthony,"  250. 

"  Masque  of  Pandora,  The,"  240, 
241. 

Materialism,  55,  115,  344. 

Matthews,  Brander,  202. 

"  Maud  Muller,"  152. 

"  Merlin,"  75. 

"  Mesmeric  Revelations,"  204. 

"  Mezzo  Cammin,"  230. 

"  Michael  Angelo,"  246-249,  255. 

Michelangelo,   187,  236,  417. 

"  Midnight  Mass  for  the  Dying 
Year,"  176. 

Milton,  202,  218,  269,  290,  362,  396, 
408,  421,  424. 

Mims,  Edwin,  373,  379,  380,  413. 

"  Minister's  Daughter,  The,"  134. 

"  Minstrel,"  269. 

Miracle,   307. 

Missionary  hymn,  Bryant's,  33. 

Missions,  Christian,  88,  344. 

"  Mithridates,"  70. 

"  Mogg  Megone,"  127. 

"  Moll  Pitcher,"   118. 

"  Monadnoc,"  90,  251. 

Monism,   100. 

Moore,  Thomas,  353. 

Morality,  in  relation  to  art  and  re- 
ligion, 423. 

"  Morituri  Salutamus,"  255. 

Morley,  John,  66,  94. 

Morris,  410. 

Morris,  G.  P.,  426. 


"  Mortal    Antipathy,    A,"    338,    340, 

357- 

Motherwell,  250. 
Motley,  J.  L.,  358,  360. 
Muller,  George,  78. 
"  Murders     of     the     Rue     Morgue, 

The,"  175. 
"  Music,"  91. 

"  Mutual  Admiration  Society,"  230. 
"  My  Autumn  Walk,"  29. 
"  My  Captain,"  291,  434. 
"  My  Lost  Youth,"  211. 
"  My  Namesake,"  139. 
"  My  Psalm,"   155. 
"  My  Soul  and  I,"  147. 
"  My  Springs,"  383. 
"  My  Study  Windows,"  290. 
"  My  Trust,"  136. 
"  Mystic  Trumpeter,  The,"  467. 

Nature:  in  Bryant's  poetry,  22-27, 
29,  40,  42;  in  Emerson's  works, 
55-57,  65,  85,  89,  90,  103;  in  Whit- 
tier's  poems,  132;  in  the  works  of 
Holmes,  346;  what  is  included  in, 
423;  ideal  aspects  of,  424;  in  the 
view  of  Whitman,  424,  429,  432; 
beautiful  only  when  moral,  443. 

"  Nature,  The  Order  of,"  27. 

Neal,  280. 

Neoplatonism,  62. 

"  Never  or  Now,"  355. 

"  New  England  Tragedies,  The," 
235- 

Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  184. 

Nietzsche,  88,  457. 

Norton,  C.  E.,  269,  293,  315,  334, 
345- 

Nott,  Richard,  109. 

"  Nun's  Aspiration,  The,"  78. 

"  Nux  Postcoenatica,"  332. 

"  Ode  "  at  Concord,  92. 

"  Ode  for  the  Fourth  of  July,  1876," 

313- 
"  Ode  "    on    fourth    Commemoration 

Day  of  Johns  Hopkins,  411. 
"  Ode    on    the    Birthday    of    George 

Washington,"  12. 
"  Old  English  Dramatists,  The,"  274, 

290. 


GENERAL    INDEX 


481 


"  Old  Ironsides,"  328. 

"  Old  Man's  Funeral,  The,"  42. 

Omar  Khayyam,  63. 

"  Opposition,"  402. 

"  Our  Master,"  144, 

"  Outre-Mer,"  218,  220. 

"  Over-Heart,  The,"  144. 

"  Overman,"  88. 

Over-Soul,   thz,  62,   66,  85,  87,    107, 


"  Palace  of  Art,  The,"  205. 

"  Palfrey,  To  John  Gorham,"  314. 

Palmer,  G.  K.,  442. 

Pantheism,    77,    101,    186,    344,   400, 

433,  460. 

"Paradise   Lost,"   311,  424. 
"  Paradise  of  Tears,"  43. 
"  Paradiso,"   262. 
"  Park,  The,"  69. 
Parker,  Theodore,  75,  280,  344. 
Parkman,  359. 
Parsees,  346. 
"  Parting  Health,"  360. 
"  Parting   of  the   Ways,   The,"   274, 

277. 

"  Passage  to  India,"  465. 
"  Past,  The,"  40. 
Paul,    87,    88,    239,    341,    34S,    349. 

4S4- 

Paul,  Jean,  44. 
Peirce,  Benjamin,  326,  339. 
"  Pennsylvania    Pilgrim,    T  h  e," 

Perry,   Bliss,   440,  441,   455,   457. 

Phillips,  Wendell,  282,  315. 

Philo/82. 

"  Philosophy  of  Composition,  The," 
194. 

Pierce,  Franklin,  213. 

"  Pilgrim's  Progress,"  116,  324. 

Plato,  62,  82. 

Plotinus,  62. 

Poe,  Edgar  Allan:  and  the  mechan- 
ism of  verse,  127;  poetry  and  the- 
ology of,  159-206;  contrasted  with 
Whittier,  161,  162;  biographers  of, 
163;  ancestry  and  early  training 
of,  163,  164;  in  school  abroad, 
165;  early  poems  of,  166;  dissi- 
pated at  college,  168;  broke 


with  his  patron,  169,  170;  idol- 
ized fame,  171;  wrote  little  verse, 
but  polished  it  much,  174;  suc- 
cessful with  his  stories,  174, 
tales  of  the  charnel-house,  175;  as 
editor  and  critic,  176,  alienated  his 
friends,  177;  loses  his  wife,  178- 
180;  a  creature  of  whim,  impulse, 
and  passion,  180;  dies  miserably, 
181;  an  atheist  of  the  heart,  182, 
because  of  self-conceit,  183;  gives 
his  theology  in  "  Eureka,"  184; 
an  absolute  materialist,  184;  de- 
nied immortality,  186,  187;  never 
dealt  -with  sin  against  God,  187; 
reversed  right  rules  in  his  concep- 
tion of  beauty,  188;  made  awaken- 
ing of  emotion  the  sole  aim  of 
poetry,  189;  fed  his  imagination 
on  the  abnormal,  191;  made  poetry 
the  rhythmical  creation  of  beauty, 
192;  had  no  vision  of  Christ,  193, 
198;  illustrated  his  theory  of  com- 
position in  "  The  Raven,"  195-198; 
a  master  of  technique,  198;  pro- 
pounded a  profound  theory  of 
versification,  199;  judged  by  differ- 
ent critics,  202-205;  perhaps  felt 
supreme  need  and  begged  God's 
mercy  in  his  last  words,  206;  con- 
trasted with  Longfellow,  210;  se- 
verely criticizes  Longfellow,  250; 
in  contrast  with  Lowell,  267;  in 
"  Fable  for  Critics,"  280;  con- 
trasted with  Lanfer,  372,  415,  418. 

"  Poems  on  Slavery,"  243. 

"Poet,  The,"  46,  73,  82,  91. 

"  Poet  at  the  Breakfast  Table,  The," 
338,  350. 

"Poetic  Principle,  The,"   192. 

Poetry:  natural  surroundings  not 
sufficient  to  produce,  3;  a  belated 
product  of  America,  4;  Emerson's 
conception  of,  73-75;  Milton's  es- 
sentials of,  74;  not  a  selling  com- 
modity in  Poe's  day,  174;  faith  in 
God  necessary  to  great,  189,  246, 
261,  424;  Poe's  theory  of,  192, 
194,  195,  199,  200,  202;  and  re- 
ligion, 311;  and  music,  371-373, 
452;  Lanier's  theory  of,  414,  415; 


482 


GENERAL    INDEX 


reacts  to  the  sense  of  beauty  and 

of  truth,  433. 
Poets'  Corner,  263. 
Pope,  13,  269. 
Porteus,  ii. 

Potter,  Miss  M.  S.,  219. 
"  Prayer,"  77. 
Prayer:   Emerson's  view  of,  77,   78; 

Lowell's    view    of,    299;    Lanier's 

view  of,  403,  413. 
"  Prelude,"  227. 
Prescott,  229. 

"  Present  Crisis,  The,"  281. 
"  Problem,  The,"  80. 
"  Proem,"  128. 
"  Professor  at  the   Breakfast  Table, 

The,"  338. 
"  Prometheus,"  281. 
"Prophecy  of  Samuel  Sewall,"   108. 
"  Proud  Music  of  the  Storm,"  434. 
"  Psalm  of  Life,  A,"  209,  225,  257. 
"  Psalm  of  the  West,"  393,  394. 
"  Purgatorio,"  262. 
Puritanism,  341. 
Puritans:    and    love    for    nature,    4; 

and     recognition     of     a     present 

Christ,    45;    intolerant,    no,    HI; 

fortitude  and  faith  of,  236. 
Puseyism,  113. 

"  Quadroon  Girl,  The,"  243. 

"  Quaker  of  the  Olden  Time,  The," 
114. 

Quakerism,  108,  157,  428. 

Quakers:  and  externalism,  66;  ec- 
centricities of,  no;  persecuted, 
no,  in;  and  anti-slavery  discus- 
sion, 119,  143;  fortitude  and  faith 
of,  236;  influenced  Whitman,  428. 

"  Quatrains,"  74. 

"  Questions  of  Life,"   132. 

"  Rainy  Day,  The,"  230. 

Rascas,  Bernard,  26. 

"  Rationale  of  Verse,  The,"  199. 

"  Raven,  The,"   180,    195-198,  203. 

"  Reaper    and    the    Flowers,    The," 

258. 

"  Receive  thy  Sight,"  32. 
"  Remonstrance,"  400. 
"  Resurrection,"  385. 


Richardson,  G.  W.,  326. 

Robertson,  F.  W.,  20. 

Robespierre,  94. 

"  Rose-Morals,"  403. 

Rossetti,  444. 

Rousseau,  94,  440,  452,  453. 

Ruskin,  396,  435. 

"  Rykman,  Andrew,"  137. 

Saadi,  63. 

"  Sacrifice,"  93. 

Salis-Seewis,  260. 

"  Saul,"  300. 

Schleiermacher,  97. 

"  School-Boy,  The,"  325. 

Schoolcraft,  232. 

Schopenhauer,  56. 

"  Science  of  English  Verse,"  397, 
399- 

"  Self-reliance,"  79- 

Seneca,  89. 

"  Shadow  and  the  Light,  The,"   148. 

Shakespeare,  13,  17,  82,  362,  387, 
398,  410,  413,  421- 

"  Shakspeare,"   82. 

"  She  Came  and  Went,"  301. 

Shearer,  Thomas,  410. 

Shelley,  13,  418. 

Sin:  in  conception  of  Bryant,  23-27; 
in  the  thought  of  Emerson,  66,  67, 
86;  in  the  thought  of  Whittier, 
i37>  138;  in  the  view  of  Poe,  187; 
in  the  view  of  Longfellow,  223, 
236;  in  the  view  of  Lowell,  297, 
300,  307,  309;  in  the  view  of 
Holmes,  340-344,346,  348-350,354! 
in  the  view  of  Lanier,  399-401, 
404,  409,  410;  in  the  view  of 
Whitman,  436,  459. 

"  Singer  in  the  Prison,  The,"  466. 

"  Sketch  Book,  The,"  212,  218. 

Smith,  Samuel  F.,  326. 

Smith,  Sydney,  421. 

Snell,  Ebenezer,  6. 

"  Snow-Bound,"  128,  150,  157. 

"  Snow-storm,  The,"  90. 

Socrates,  410. 

"  Solution,"  74. 

"  Song  for  the  Jacquerie,"  383. 

"  Song  of  Nature,"  82. 

"  Song  of  the  Exposition,"  434. 


GENERAL    INDEX 


483 


"  Song  of  the  Future,  A,"  406. 
"  Song  of  the  Redwood  Tree,"  434. 
"  Song  of  the  Silent  Land,"  260. 
"  Song  of  the  Stars,"  23. 
"  Song  of  the  Universal,"  434,  467. 
"  Sonnets   upon   the   Punishment   of 

Death,"  308. 
"  Sordello,"  294. 
"  Spanish  Student,  The,"  231. 
"  Special  Pleading,"  398. 
Spencer,  Herbert,   187,  194. 
Spenser,  269. 

"  Sphinx,  The,"  53,  55,  68. 
Spinoza,  63. 

"  Stanzas  on  Freedom,"  280. 
Stedman,  75,  127. 
"  Stirrup-Cup,  The,"  405. 
Stoddard,  10. 
Stoicism,   142,  254,  343. 
Stowe,   Mrs.    H.    B.,   283,    339,    354, 

361. 

"  Street,  The  Crowded,"  27. 
Sumner,  Charles,  94,  125,  229,  359. 
"  Sun-Day  Hymn,  A,"  347. 
"  Sunrise,"  406,  415. 
"  Sunset  on  the  Bearcamp,"  133. 
Swedenborg,  63,  408. 
Swinburne,   136,  203,  410,  444. 
Symonds,  J.  A.,  439,  440. 
"  Symphony,  The,"  389. 

"  Tales    of   the   Arabesque    and   the 

Grotesque,"  174. 
".Tamerlane,"  171,  172. 
"  Tamerlane     and     Other     Poems," 

171. 

Tauler,  63. 

Taylor,  Bayard,  390,  410. 
Taylor,  Father,  72. 
Tennyson,    44,    202,    205,    228,    238, 

249,  408,  421. 

"Tent  on  the  Beach,"  117,  128. 
"  Terminus,"  99. 
Thackeray,  321. 
"  Thanatopsis,"  10,  n,  44. 
Thoreau,  103,  442. 
"  Thousand  and   One  Nights,   The," 

425- 

"  Threnody,"  81,  95,  96,  99,  251. 
Ticknor,  George,  219,  290. 
"  Tiger-Lilies,"  412. 


"  To  a  Waterfowl,"  29,  30. 
"  To  Beethoven,"  412. 
"  To  Canaan,"  354. 
"  To  Helen,"  166. 
"  To  Him  that  was  Crucified,"  459. 
"  To  Holmes,"  367. 
"  To  lanthe,"  214. 
"  To  John  Gorham  Palfrey,"  314. 
"To  My  Old  Schoolmaster,"  116. 
"To  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes,"   158. 
"To  Richard  Wagner,"  411. 
Transcendentalism,   54-62,  64,  66. 
"  Translations,"  91. 
Trinity,  the:   in  the  view   of   Whit- 
tier,   140;  denied,  222. 
"  Two  Travellers,  The,"  43. 

"  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,"  283. 
Unitarianism,     101,     115,    221,    304, 

324,  343-346. 
"  Uriel,"  68. 

Van  Dyke,  66. 

Vedas,  the,  62. 

Vergil,  212,  269,  328,  421,  436. 

"  Village  Blacksmith,  The,"   230. 

"  Vision  of  Echard,  The,"  148. 

"  Vision  of  Sir  Launfal,  The,"  274, 

278,  289. 

Vivian,  Frances,  204. 
"  Voices    of    the    Night,    The,"    176, 

225. 
"  Voluntaries,"  72. 

Waite,  Chief  Justice,  153. 

"  Waiting  by  the  Gate,"  36. 

"  Waldehses,  Hymn  of  the,"  26. 

Waller,  392. 

Ward,  William  Hayes,  373,  396. 

Warren,  Samuel,  427. 

Waverley  Novels,  425. 

Webster,  Daniel,  94,  in,  125,  126. 

Weismann,  342. 

Wells,  William,  269. 

"  West  Wind,  The,"  24. 

"  What  Mr.  Robinson  Thinks,"  286. 

"  What  the  Voice  Said,"  138. 

White,  H.  K.,  ii. 

White,  Miss  Maria,  271. 

Whitman,  Walt:  criticized  by  Lanier, 
410;  poetry  and  theology  of,  410- 
470;  acclaimed  by  many  as  a  con- 


484 


GENERAL    INDEX 


spicuous  American  poet,  421;  sig- 
nificantly chooses  the  nickname 
"  Walt,"  421;  declaration  of  inde- 
pendence by,  422^  _',  seeks  to  get 
back  to  nature,  422;  leading  repre- 
sentative of  free-verse,  423,  424; 
the  philosophy  underlying  the 
verse  of,  424;  formative  influences 
of  boyhood  of,  425;  a  born  Bohe- 
mian, 426;  genesis  of  genius  of, 
427;  devotes  himself  to  literature, 
427;  sources  of  philosophy  of, 
428;  a  pantheist,  like  the  Brah- 
man, 429;  would  voice  the  human- 
ity of  the  illiterate  horde,  430;  un- 
changed by  Emerson's  criticisms, 
431;  a  poet  of  chaos,  432;  imi- 
tates the  voices  of  physical  and 
animal  nature,  433;  could  write 
poetry  when  stirred  by  something 
outside  himself,  435;  egotism  of, 
435;  the  coarse  ego  in  verses  of, 
437,  438;  thesis  of,  439;  chose 
a  non-moral  God,  439;  immorality 
of,  439;  a  poseur,  440;  exalted 
obscenity  into  a  principle,  443; 
changed  by  the  Civil  War,  445; 
received  impulse  to  self-sacrifice, 
446;  a  battered,  wrecked,  old 
man,  447;  natural  gifts  of,  447; 
conflicting  views  of  Camden  life 
of,  448;  called  poet  of  democracy, 
449;  anarchy  the  democracy  of, 
450;  influence  of  music  on  verses 
of,  452;  had  fancy  to  found  a  re- 
ligion, 453;  bursts  of  lofty  thought 
in  verses  of,  454;  the  religion  of, 
457;  compared  self  with  great  re- 
ligious leaders,  458;  deifies  him- 
self, 460,  461 ;  had  hope  of  im- 
mortality with  a  recognition  of  un- 
changing abnormity,  462-465,  467; 
a  poet  in  the  lower  realms  of 
poetry,  468;  without  God  and 
without  hope,  470. 
Whittier,  John  Greenleaf :  poetry  and 
theology  of,  105-158;  most  Ameri- 
can of  our  poets,  107;  an  Ortho- 
dox Quaker,  108,  109,  143,  428; 
a  believer  in  Christ,  109;  of 
Quaker  and  Huguenot  parentage, 


in;  personal  habits  of,  113;  con- 
trasted with  Emerson,  114;  early 
surroundings  and  privations  of, 
115;  early  verses  of,  116;  a  natural 
editor,  117;  espoused  anti-slavery 
cause,  119-125;  a  fighting  spirit, 
but  a  non-resistant,  123;  contrasted 
with  Garrison,  124;  early  faults  of 
verses  of,  127;  financial  success  of, 
128;  recipient  of  public  esteem, 
129;  religious  views  of,  130-158; 
hymns  of,  130,  144,  154,  252;  a 
man  of  one  Book,  131;  believed  in 
a  personal  God,  132;  anti-slavery 
poems  of,  134;  had  a  genuine  con- 
viction of  sin,  137,  138,  and  trust 
in  divine  mercy,  138,  139;  believed 
in  the  divinity  of  Christ,  140;  had 
a  practical  view  of  the  Trinity, 
140,  141;  accepted  Christ's  sacri- 
fice, 142;  not  far  from  Calvinism, 
142,  145;  believed  in  the  triumph 
of  goodness,  146;  not  a  Universal- 
ist,  147;  believed  in  personal  im- 
mortality, 148-150;  defects  of 
poetry  of,  151;  most  potent  poet 
of  the  anti-slavery  movement,  152; 
contrasted  with  other  poets,  152; 
rewarded  for  service  and  sacrifice, 
153;  last  days  of,  154-158;  the 
humble  friend  of  God,  157;  con- 
trasted with  Poe,  161,  162;  con- 
trasted with  Longfellow,  210; 
urged  Longfellow  to  run  for  Con- 
gress, 243;  poet  of  Liberty,  244; 
in  contrast  with  Lowell,  267;  in 
"Fable  for  Critics,"  280;  memo- 
rial of  Holmes  to,  359;  criticized 
Whitman,  414. 

Whittier,  Thomas,  no. 

Whitty,  J.  H.,  167,  187. 

Wilde,  Oscar,  443. 

Wilkinson,  W.  C.,  47,  48. 

"  William  Wilson,"   165. 

Williams,  Roger,  120. 

Willis,  177,  280. 

"  Winter-Evening  Hymn  to  my  Fire, 
A,"  306. 

Winthrop,  Robert  C.,  153. 

Woodberry,  George  E.,  163. 

"  Woodnotes  "  II,  64,  90. 


GENERAL    INDEX 


485 


Woodrow,  James,  377. 

Woolman,  John,  137. 

"  Word,  The,"  131. 

Wordsworth,   n,   13,  21,  45,  46,   75, 

308,  414,  421,  427. 
"  World-Soul,  The,"  99. 
"  World's  Homage,  The,"  361. 


"  Worship  of  Nature,  The,"  133. 
"  Written  at  Rome,"  92. 

"  Xenophanes,"  85. 

"  Year's  Life,  A,"  273. 
"  Yellow  Violet,"  24. 


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